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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1S65, by 
BAKER, SMITH & CO., 

In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States, for the 
Southern District of New York. 


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DESCRIPTION 

OP 

BAKER, SMITH & CO.’S 

PATENT LOW-PRESSURE, SELF-REGULATING 

Steam Warming and Ventilating Apparatus, 

FOR 

PRIVATE DWELLINGS AND OTHER BUILDINGS. 


No. 37 Mercer Street, New York. 


In the cellar, or some other convenient locality, is 
placed a simply constructed Steam Generator, made of 
very heavy wrought iron. This, with its necessary ap¬ 
pendages, is mounted within a handsome and substantial 
enclosure of brick and iron, so as to insure the least 
danger from fire and the greatest economy in fuel. It is 
usually located at the base of the chimney, thus avoid¬ 
ing the objectionable smoke-pipe. The whole occupies 
but a small space, (in ordinary dwelling-houses about 
four feet square by five feet high,) although the size 
varies according to the amount of space required to be 
warmed. 

The Steam Generator, and all of the pipes connected 
with it, are tested before use, by a pressure of two hun¬ 
dred pounds to the square inch. This is only to prove 
their substantiality, as the pressure under which the 
apparatus operates is limited to five pounds per square 
inch. At this limit the Generator is at once opened to 
1 







2 


the external atmosphere through a large vent, which 
makes the further accumulation of steam impossible. 

From the Steam Generator the hot vapor is con¬ 
ducted through small wrought-iron tubes (no matter how 
far) to the various points where heat is desired. Our 
favorite plan is to convey the air warmed by steam, 
(having warmed it in chambers separately provided 
therefor,) instead of the steam itself, to the rooms to be 
warmed. The steam-warmed air is conducted through 
flues and registers similar in construction and location 
to those of the common furnaces. These registers occupy 
no available room, being placed either in the walls or 
floors, and allow the admission of heat to be very nicely 
adjusted simply by moving them by the hand. By this 
method every opening for the admission of warm air into 
the living apartments has its corresponding chamber, or 
reservoir of heat, directly beneath it, in some lower 
room, or in the cellar. Against the steam-heated sur¬ 
faces placed within each of these chambers, fresh external 
air is warmed and conducted upward to the apartments. 

By the arrangement of separate and distinct chambers 
of heat at the base of each vertical warm-air duct, the 
unequal flow of heated air, as through the usual long 
and irregular horizontal lengths of hot-air ducts, is 
avoided. 

Where the heating surfaces cannot conveniently be 
placed below, or where ventilation can be dispensed with, 
radiators, finished with ornamental designs, or heating 
stacks covered with handsome screens in the form of 
pieces of furniture, &c., can be tastefully arranged di¬ 
rectly within the rooms to be warmed, and in various 
other ways adapted to the circumstances of the case. 

The Fire Begulates its own Draft. When steam 
accumulates to any required pressure, (say one-half 


3 


pound for moderate weather,) a sufficient mechanical 
force is obtained, when applied to our sensitive Draft- 
Regulator, to check the draft of the fire, and consequent¬ 
ly any further increase of steam. Or, if an additional 
room is to be warmed and more steam is used, so that 
the steam force falls below the one-half pound, the draft 
door again opens, and the fire and steam increase to the 
point at which the closing of the draft and the pressure 
of the steam is fixed. 

By simply changing the weights marked, “ For 
Moderate Weather,” “For Cold Weather,” “ For Yery 
Cold Weather,” a scale of pressure from 0 to 5 pounds, 
and a range of temperature from 212° to 228° (sixteen 
degrees) is obtained, which is a sufficient variety for the 
ordinary changes of weather. 

Our Self-Operating Air-Valve is attached to each 
radiator, coil, or stack of heating surfaces, which allows 
the air within their interiors to escape. This must be 
accomplished before steam can enter, and its heat become 
available, as air and steam cannot occupy the same space 
at the same time. This air-valve is also a safeguard 
against the accumulation of steam beyond a very limited 
amount, as its operation insures the using up of the 
steam by condensation in all of the heating surfaces. 
The air could be let out through a vent, operated by 
hand, and closed by the same means when the steam be¬ 
gins to escape; but this would involve a great deal of 
time, uncertainty and trouble. 

Our Automatic Cold-Air Damper is attached to 
each trunk or duct used for the admission of out-door 
air. Without this, no heating surfaces can be employed 
in a direct current of exterior air, without the proba¬ 
bility of their freezing up and being destroyed. By 






4 


means of it, the in-flow of out-door air to the warm air- 
chambers is regulated. It allows only such an amount 
of air to enter as the heating surfaces have capacity to 
warm properly, and closes tightly when the fire goes 
out, thus preventing cold or imperfectly warmed air 
from passing through the registers. 

Our Water Safety-Vent and Low-Water Alarm, 
consisting of a large open tube extending to such a 
height that the hydrostatic weight of a column of water 
within it will counterbalance the required limited pres¬ 
sure of steam, is a most important attachment. One end 
of this tube is attached to the inside of the Steam Gen¬ 
erator, and is open at the lowest point to which it is 
prudent to allow the water to fall; the other end is 
also open, and terminates over the fire. If the pressure 
of steam overcomes the column of water in this tube, 
the water is forced out till the end is no longer sub¬ 
merged, and the steam, unrestrained, blows upon the 
fire, and, excluding the air, extinguishes it, and other¬ 
wise gives notice that the draft door has been carelessly 
left open. Should the water, through any cause, get too 
low, the fire is put out by the steam in the same manner 
as when the pressure is too great. By the use of this 
safety-vent, the objections to the friction and adhesion 
of metallic safety-valves, levers, weights, &c., are entire¬ 
ly obviated; this being simply a water seal between the 
steam in the generator and the external atmosphere. 

Our Water Regulator, through which the water is 
automatically supplied to the Steam Generator, can be 
attached. We have a very simple and accurate one, 
but do not advise its general adoption, as the most perfect 
of these fixtures may fail to operate. The insignificant 
quantity of water wasted after the proper amount is once 


5 


supplied, (the same being used over and over again,) and 
the trifling attention required to replace it, do not, in 
our opinion, warrant the risk. 

Ventilation in private dwellings is usually sufficient¬ 
ly secured, in our system, by the exit of air through fire¬ 
place openings, &c., which must of necessity make room for 
the inflowing warm air currents through the registers. 
But in School Buildings, Hospitals, and places where 
more thorough and positive ventilation is required, our 
plan is to place one or more steam pipes directly within 
the ventilating flues, running through and warming their 
entire lengths. This we have found, by several practical 
tests, to be a very efficient as well as simple plan. It 
must be obvious to all that a constantly heated flue in¬ 
sures a vigorous and reliable draft. 

The Engraving shows the position and relation of the 
different parts of our apparatus. The whole is simple, 
substantial, compact, readily understood, and easily man¬ 
aged. 

We earnestly ask an investigation of the principles 
relating to our system of warming and ventilation, as 
more fully treated in another part of this book. We 
also urgently invite a most critical and detailed examina¬ 
tion of the apparatus itself as erected by us for our cus¬ 
tomers, and in course of construction at our establishment, 
where also a complete apparatus may be seen in opera¬ 
tion. 

Particular attention will be given to the warming and 
ventilating of Private Dwellings. Our apparatus can be 
put into houses already built, with but little inconvenience 
to the occupants, and with very little alteration. In most 
instances where hot-air flues are in, the same can be used 
for this mode. 




6 


While every part of the apparatus shall be of the lest, 
both as regards durability and finish, the price shall be 
as low as is consistent with good work. 

We wish it to be distinctly borne in mind, that 

EVERY ESSENTIAL FEATURE OF THIS APPARATUS IS DIRECTLY 
OPPOSITE TO THE OLD-FASHIONED niGH-PRESSURE FORM OF 

steam-heating, as explained in another part of this book. 
Nothing can be more apparent than this upon an exami¬ 
nation of our system. 

With regard to its features of safety, we will here 
remark, that—independent of the perfect control of the 
fire, which we accomplish—independent of the large and 
reliable escape for all accumulation of steam above a 
very slight pressure—independent of the enormous pres¬ 
sure which every part of our apparatus is capable of 
sustaining—each of which is a reliable safeguard— we at¬ 
tach to every boiler, without any opportunity of being 
shut off\ a sufficient quantity of steam condensing sur¬ 
face to dispose of all the steam the boiler is capable of 
making. This, in point of safety, is equivalent to hav¬ 
ing the steam carried off into the open air as fast as gen¬ 
erated. 

Saving of Fuel. In this respect we are confident our 
apparatus possesses superior advantages. By testing the 
temperature of smoke as it escapes up chimney, it will be 
seen that all the available caloric of the fuel is consumed 
in passing over the generator in making steam and heat¬ 
ing the returned water. 

The draft is so perfectly under automatic control that 
the fire burns exactly according to the varying condition 
of the weather, and the requirements of the occupants 
of the house. 

These are the principal reasons why our apparatus is 
more economical in the consumption of fuel in proportion 
to the amount of heat produced than any other. 


NOTICE. 


In consequence of attempts made by certain parties to imitate 
our apparatus by appropriating various portions of it and dishonor¬ 
ably copying our patterns, we think proper to state that we have 
secured the exclusive patent right to every important part of our ar¬ 
rangement. We therefore give notice that we shall prosecute to the 
extent of the law , every person infringing upon our rights, 

BAKER, SMITH & CO., 

37 Mercer Street, 

New York. 








EXPLANATION OF ENGRAVING. 

The engraving represents a section of a dwelling house with one 
of our Steam Generators set in the cellar, showing three modes of 
applying the heat. The centre room is being warmed in our usual 
and most preferred manner, viz.: through a register placed in the 
wall, with the heating surfaces beneath in the cellar. This room is 
also ventilated by a corresponding outflow of air through the ven¬ 
tilating flue J, as indicated by the arrow. In the centre of this flue 
is run a steam pipe which rarefies the air and causes a strong up¬ 
ward flow at all times. 

The right-hand room is wanned by one of our tubular radiators, 
(which may be made quite ornamental,) placed directly within it. 
One pipe supplies the steam, and the same also takes back the water 
of condensation. The valve at the lower right-hand corner is to 
let on or shut off the steam. This mode of warming apartments 
does not insure ventilation, as the same air is heated over and over 
again. 

The room represented on the left is also supplied with direct 
heat by a stack of heating surfaces, covered with an ornamental 
fret-work having a top in the shape of a table or some other piece of 
furniture. The ventilation here, as well as in the one warmed by 
a radiator, is merely incidental. 

The regulator for the draft to the fire is represented with the two 
chains, one attached to the upper, the other to the lower draft 
door. Balls of different weight, to determine the pressure at which 
the draft shall begin to close, are provided, one of which is suspended 
on the end of the lever of the regulator. Other spare ones are 
shown hanging against the wall at the left of the generator. These 
balls are marked to indicate the one required to produce the requi¬ 
site temperature of steam for any change of weather. 

If closing the lower draft does not sufficiently check the fire, the 
upper one opens, thus reversing the draft, and most effectually stop¬ 
ping further increase of heat. (We have latterly adopted opening 
a door in the chimney back of the generator instead of opening the 
fire door, as a preferable plan to accomplish this object) 

a. Feed door for coal, (also used in controlling the draft to the 
fire.) 

b. Ash-pit door, (also used in controlling the draft to the fire.) 
c c. Small doors to open for cleaning out smoke flues of the gene¬ 
rator. 

d. Water safety-vent. 

e. Water-gauge. 

f. Water supply pipe. 

g. Pipe for drawing water from the generator, when it becomes 
foul. 

h. Steam pipe for supplying the heating surfaces. 

m. Pipe for conducting the water of condensation back to the 
generator. 

k. Duct for supplying out door air to the heating surfaces of the 
register. 

x. Automatic damper for regulating or shutting off the out¬ 
door air. 


BAKER, SMITH & CO. 

respectfully refer, by permission, to the following parties 
who have their apparatus. 

NEW YORK CITY. 

WILLIAM H. MACY, Esq., 29 Wall St., house 47 East 21st Street. 
(See letter, page 38.) 

JOHN TAYLOR JOHNSTON, Esq., G9 Wall St., house 8 Fifth 
Avenue. 

DR. THOMAS WARD, house 1 West 47th St. (See letter, page 28.) 
JOSEPH WALKER, Esq., 31 Pine Street, house 31 East 36th Str. 
(See letter, page 45.) 

PETER COOPER, Esq., 17 Burling Slip, house 9 Lexington Ave. 
(See letter, page 23.) 

EDWARD LEARNED, Esq., 48 Pine Street, house 200 Madison 
Ave. (See letter, page 21.) 

CHARLES C. GOODHUE,, Esq., house 171 Madison Avenue. 

DR. E. E. MARCY, 26 East 22d Street, house 396 Fifth Avenne. 
(See letter, page 40.) 

MONTAGNIE WARD, Esq., 130 William St., house 501 Fifth Ave. 
(See letter, page 30.) 

W. BARCLAY PARSONS, Esq., 5 Hanover Street, house 503 Fifth 
Ave. (See letter, page 29.) 

JOHN H. SWIFT, Esq., 263 Canal St., house 26 W r est 20th Street. 
(See letter, page 34.) 

C. D. VAN WAGENEN, Esq., 27 Water St., house 39 West 19th St. 
(See letter, page 33.) 

WM. G. READ, Esq., 41 Wall Street, house 30 West 17th Street. 
(See letter, page 25.) 

THOMAS CHRISTY, Esq., 25 Murray Street, house 418 West 23d 
Street. 

SAMUEL S. CONSTANT, Esq., 25 Murray Street, house 420 West 
23d Street. 

E. V. HAUGHWOUT, Esq., 488 Broadway, house 92 East 21st St. 
1 * 


10 


JAMES M. CONSTABLE, Esq., 309 Canal Street, house 33 West 
23d Street. (See letter , page 36.) 

GEORGE GREER, Esq., 152 Pearl Street, house 7 West 29th St. 
OLIVER CHARLICK, Esq., house 254 West 34th Street. (See 
letter , page 22.) 

WM. HENRY SMITH, Esq., 34 Vesey Street, houses 10 West 38th 
Street and Fifth Ave. (See letter , page 42.) 

DR. VALENTINE MOTT, house 1 Gramercy Park. (See letter , 
page 28.) 

HON. WM. V. BRADY, 102 Broadway, two houses, 448 and 450 
Fifth Avenue. 

HON. BAYARD CLARKE, 51 Liberty Street, house 18 East 29th 
Street. (See letter, page 44.) 

GEORGE T. TRIMBLE, Esq., 106 John Street, house 15 East 
25th St. 

GEORGE J. BYRD, Esq., 12 Warren Street, house 6 West 29th 
Street. (See letter , page 39.) 

THOMAS R. HAWLEY, Esq., 102 Broad St., house 6 West 38th St. 
WILLIAM H. WEBB, Esq., 200 Lewis Street, house 450 Fifth Ave. 
R. B. CURRIER, Esq., 42 Warren Street, house 31 West 38th St. 
(See letter, page 27.) 

ESLEY MELIUS, Esq., 42 Warren Street, house 33 West 38th St. 
(See letter , page 25.) 

HORACE SMITH, Esq., house 27 West 38th St. (See letter,page 42.) 
A. W. WINANS, Esq., house 30 East 39th St. (See letter , page 34.) 
C1RUS CLARK, Esq. 343 Broadway, house 10 East 41st Street. 
(See letter , page 41.) 

JAMES D. SPARKMAN, Esq., Pres’t Manuf’s Bank, Brooklyn. 
House 27 West 42d Street. 

ROB1. O. GLOVER, Esq., 158 Broadway, house Manhattanville. 
(See letter , page 32.) 

PETER S. HENDERSON, Esq., Cashier Brooklyn Bank, house 70 
West 47th Street. 

JOHN L. YOUNG, Esq., house, 25 West 42d Street. 

J. COUPER LORD, Esq., 139 Greenwich St., house 24 Gramercy 
Park. (See letter , page 25.) 

GEORGE S. WRIGHT, Esq., house 56 East 21st Street. 
FLORENCE VERDIN, Esq., 55 Cedar St., house 55 St. Mark’s 
Place. 

JOHN L. BROWN, Esq., house cor. 62d Street and Lexington 
Avenue. (See letter , page 31.) 


11 


ROSS W. WOOD, Esq., 90 Front Street, house 2 West 29th Street 

A. A. ALYORD, Esq., house 10 West 31st St. (See letter , page 23.) 
DR. CHARLES R. LOHMAN, house cor. Fifth Avenue and 52d St. 
BENJAMIN R. WINTHROP, Esq., 516 Broadway, house 134 

Second Avenue. 

SAMUEL WILLETS, Esq., 303 Pearl Street, house 24 Lafayette 
Place. 

JAMES L. PHIPPS, Esq., 51 Harrison St., house 217 Madison Av. 
DANIEL E. VAN YOLKENBURGH, Esq., 42 Barclay Street, 
house Fifth Avenue. 

PHILIP VAN VOLKENBURGH, Esq., 79 Leonard Street, house 
Fifth Avenue. 

B. I. H. TRASK, Esq., 62 South Street, house 457 Fifth Avenue. 
RALPH WELLS, Esq., house 116 East 16th Street. 

WM. A. DOOLEY, Esq., house Fifth Ave. near 54th Street. 

A. H. BARNEY, Esq., 82 Broadway, house 24 East 38th Street. 
CARL STRUVER, Esq., 148 Pearl Street, house Bloomingdale. 

DR. E. J. DUNNING, house 11 Waverley Place. 

R. H. HINSDALE, Esq., 99 Chambers St., house 50 East 49th St. 
THOMAS FAYE, Esq., 814 Broadway, house 152d Street and 
Broadway. 

MALTBY G. LANE, Esq., 76 Fourth Ave., house Fort Washington. 
RICHARD H. LANE, Esq., foot 129th St., house Fort Washington. 
F. F. THOMPSON, Esq., 2 Wall Street, house 271 Madison Ave. 
F. H. MACY, Esq., 189 Front Street, house West 47th Street. 
JOHN H. MACY, Esq., 189 Front Street, house West 47th Street. 
SYLVANUS J. MACY, Esq., 189 Front Street, house West 47th 
Street. 

REV. THOMAS TREANOR, house 30 Mott Street. 

F. W. COGGILL, Esq., 78 Broad St., two houses, Fifth Avenue. 
LEATHER MANUFACTURERS’ BANK, 29 Wall St. (See letter , 
page 38.) 

BANK OF THE COMMONWEALTH, 15 Nassau Street. 

PARK BANK, 3 Beekman Street. ([See letter , page 43.) 
CONTINENTAL INSURANCE CO. Offices, 102 Broadway. 
(See letter, page 35.) 

NEW YORK LIFE INSURANCE CO. Offices, 112 Broadway. 
(See letter , page 38.) 

NORTH AMERICAN INSURANCE CO. Offices, 114 Broadway. 
(See letter , page 44.) 


12 


HOME INSURANCE CO. Offices, 135 Broadway. 0 See letter, 
page 55.) 

METROPOLITAN GAS LIGHT CO. Offices, cor. Broadway and 
42d Street. (See letter, page 40.) 

ARTHUR LEARY & CO. Offices, 73 William Street. 

A. A. LOW & BROS. Offices, 31 Burling Slip. 

W. A. FOWLER, Esq. Offices, 64 Broadway. 

EDWARD MATTHEWS, Esq., 57 Exchange Place. Offices, 40, 
42 and 57 Broadway. 

NEW YORK PRODUCE EXCHANGE, Whitehall Street. 

OPEN BOARD OF STOCK BROKERS. Offices, 16 & 18 Broad 
Street. 

MASONIC LODGE, 817 Broadway. 

HOFFMAN HOUSE, cor. Broadway and 25th Street. 

OGDEN & BLEWETT. Store, 325 Broadway. ( See letter , page 41.) 

KNISELY, MYERS & CO. Store, 327 Broadway. 

GEORGE W. MOORE, Esq. Store, 329 Broadway. 

SINGER MANUFACTURING CO. Store, 458 Broadway. (See 
letter, page 20.) 

H. E. LEGRAIN, Esq. Store, 729 Broadway. 

J. C. HOWE & CO. Store, 59 Worth Street. (See letter, page 41.) 

DEMAS BARNES & CO. Store, 21 Park Row. 

JOHN TAYLOR’S SONS. Store, 334 Greenwich Street. (See 
letter, page 50.) 

JOHN C. JOHNSON & CO. Store, 36 Howard Street. (See 
letter, page 33.) 

SCOTT & BALDWIN. Store, 505 Broadway. (See letter , page 55.) 

ST. PATRICK’S CATHEDRAL SCHOOL, Mulberry Street. 

CHURCH OF TRANSFIGURATION PAROCHIAL SCHOOL, 
Mott Street. 

WARD SCHOOL NO. 3. 490 Hudson Street corner of Grove Street. 

THIRD REFORMED PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH. 238 West 23d 
Street. (See letter , page 22.) 

NEPTUNE STEAM SHIP CO. Offices, Pier 27 N. R. 

BROOKLYN. 

E. H. R. LYMAN, Esq., 31 Burling Slip, New York, house 
28 Remsen Street. 

H. A. TUCKER, Esq., 4 Broad Street, New York, house 62 Rem¬ 
sen Street. 


13 


JAMES M. BENHAM, Esq., 108 Broad St, New York, house 
. /0 -^ emsen Street. (See letter, page 46.) 

JOHN A. CONE, Esq., 354 Broadway, New York, house 90 
Kemsen Street. (See letter, page 30.) 

WILLIAM H. MELLEN, Esq, 140 Church Street, New York 
house 102 Columbia Street. (See letter, page 281 

S. B. CALDWELL, Esq, 20 Old Slip, New York, house 71 
Montague St. (See letter, page 46.) 

ADMIRAL S. H. STRINGHAM, house 106 Hicks Street 

WILLIAM J. A. FULLER, Esq., 51 Liberty Street, New York, 
house 102 Hicks Street. (See letter, page 36.) 

JOHN McGEE, Esq., 135 Broadway, New York, house 148 
Hicks St. (See letter, page 55.) 

H. B. CLAFLIN, Esq, 140 Church St, New York, house 41 
Pierrepont Street. 

E. 0. READ, Esq, 41 Wall St, New York, house 121 Remseu 
Street. 

w w C ^’ ESq -’ 61 Broadwa - v > New York, house 96 Columbia St 

M. T. LYhtDE, Esq., house 117 Columbia Street. 

CHARLES STORRS, Esq., 121 Chambers Street, New York, house 
148 Duffield Street. (Sec letter, page 42.) 

AUGUSTUS STORRS, Esq., 121 Chambers Street, New York 
house 150 Duffield Street. (See letter, page 43.) 

GEORGE M. WOODWARD, Esq., 77 Beekman Street, New York, 
house Park Place. (See letter, page 49.) 

JOSEPH WILDE, Esq., 11 Dutch St., New York, house 106 Ross 
Street. (See letter, page 29.) 

WILLIAM TUTTLE, Esq., 74 Beckman St., New York, house 
Bushwick Av. 

JAMES H. TAFT, Esq, 62 William St, New York, house Clinton 
Avenue. 

CHARLES PRATT Esq., 106 Fulton St., New York, house Clinton 
Avenue. (Nee letter , page 38.) ' 

WILLIAM H. TAYLOR, Esq., 150 Front St., New York, house 
Clinton Avenue. 

LEWIS BEACH, Esq., house Clinton Avenue. 

GEORGE W. HENNINGS, Esq,, 76 Beaver St., New York, house 
67 West Warren Street. (Nee letter, page 23.) 

JOHN F. COOK, Esq., 87 Broad St., New York, house 389 Wash¬ 
ington Avenue. (See letter, page 46.) 


14 


Mrs. L. A. BACON, house Washington Avenue. 

JOHN DAYOL, Esq., 100 John St., New York, house Clinton Av. 

Col. S. A. DODGE, house Gates Avenue. (See letter , page 39.) 

E. L. ROBERTS, Esq., Montague St, house Gates Avenue. 

ARIEL PATTERSON, Esq., 273 First Street, house 2 South 9th 
Street. 

Hon. F. 0. J. SMITH, house corner South 8th and Second Streets. 

CHARLES A. MEIGS, Esq., 50 Exchange Place, New York, house 
St Mark’s Place. 

CHAPMAN & FLINT, 57 South St., New York, 7 houses, Columbia 
Street. 

A. SIMPSON, Esq., 73 Fulton St., New York, house Downing St. 

R. F. MASON, Esq., 114 Broadway, New York, house Oxford St. 
(See letter , page 46.) 

JOHN NEIDLINGER, Esq., 101 Maiden Lane, New York, house 
240 Carlton Avenue. 

R. W. ADAMS, Esq., 116 Wall St., New York, house cor. New 
York Avenue and St. Mark’s Place. 

MISCELLANEOUS PLACES. 

JOHN F. SEAMON, Esq., house Kings Bridge. (See letter, page 
50.) 

ISAAC H. KNOX, Esq., 90 Broadway, New York, house Yonkers. 

MARIA WILLETS, house Harrison’s, N. Y. 

A. G. TRASK, Esq., 42 Warren St., New York, house Irvington, 
N. Y. (See letter , page 24.) 

E. W. DUNHAM, Esq., 13 William St., New York, house Irving¬ 
ton, N. Y. 

JAS. L. DUNHAM, Esq., 13 William St., New York, house Irving¬ 
ton, N. Y. 

Mrs. GEO. F. HUSSEY, house Peekskill, N. Y. (See letter , page 
50.) 

GEORGE DAYTON, Esq., house Peekskill, N. Y. (See letter , 
page 19.) 

BENJ. KITTRIDGE, Esq., house Peekskill, N. Y. 

D. H. CRAIG, Esq., 145 Broadway, New York, house Peekskill, 
N. Y. 

HON. HAMILTON FISH, 180 Tenth St., New York, house Gar¬ 
rison’s, N. Y. 

WILLIAM W. CARSON, Esq., house Newburgh, N. Y. 


15 




GEORGE A. ELLIOT, Esq., house Newburgh, N. Y. ( See letter, 
page 26.) 

GEORGE GORDON Esq., house Newburgh, N. Y. 

S. R. VAN DUZER, Esq., 200 Greenwich St., New York, house 

Newburgh, N. Y. 

SCHUREMAN HALSTED, Esq., 52 Murray St., New York, house 
Mamaroneck, N. Y. ( See letter , page 34.) 

A. W. GREENLEAF, Esq., 17 Wall St., New York, house Mamaro¬ 
neck, N. Y. 

METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, Mamaroneck, N. Y. ( See 
letter, page 35.) 

HON. C. C. ALGER, house Hudson, N. Y» ( See letter, page 26.) 
GEORGE E. GRAY, Esq., house State Street, Albany, N. Y. ( See 
letter , page 49.) 

WILLIAM F. BURDEN, Esq., house Troy, N. Y. (See letter, 
page 49.) 

W. HOWARD HART, Esq., house Troy, N. Y. 

H. BURDEN & CO. Office, Troy, N. Y. 

MRS. R. P. HART, house Troy, N. Y. 

PETER THALIMER, Esq., house Troy, N. Y. (See letter, page 47.) 
F. W. FARNUM, Esq., house Troy, N. Y. 

J. B. PIERSON, Esq., house Troy, N. Y. (See letter, page 48.) 

D. THOMAS YAIL, Esq., house Troy, N. Y. (See letter, page 48.) 
SAMUEL M. YAIL, Esq., house Troy, N. Y. (See letter, page 47.) 
TROY CITY BANK, Troy, N. Y. 

PROVINCIAL SEMINARY, Troy, N. Y. 

C. C. TABER, Esq., 148 Pearl St., New York, house Staten Island. 
JULIUS DEJONGE, Esq., 160 William St., New York, house 
Staten Island. 

T. S. DOREMUS, Esq., 204 Duane St., New York, house Jersey 

City, N. J. (See letter, page 27.) 

JOB MALE, Esq., house Jersey City, N. J. 

A. S. JEWELL, Esq., 27 Water St., New York, house Jersey City, 
N. J, (See letter, page 18.) 

JOSEPH DIXON, Esq., house Jersey City, N, J. 

N. B. LANE, Esq., 90 Broad Street, New York, house Bergen 
Point, N. J. (See letter, page 31.) 

E. L. WALTON, Esq., house Bergen Point, N. J. (See letter, 

page 54.) 





16 


L. W. BADGER, Esq., 2 State St., New York, house Bergen Point, 
N. J. 

CYRUS PECK, Esq., 102 Broadway, New York, house Newark, N. J. 

D. A. HEALD, Esq., 135 Broadway, New York, house Orange, N. J. 
JACOB HALSTED, Esq., 30 Pine Street, New York, house 

Orange, N. J. 

THOMAS FENNER, Esq., 40 Yesey Street, New York, house 
South Orange, N. J. ( See letter, page 24.) 

P. H. VAN RIPER, Esq., 26 Moore St., New York, house Mont¬ 
clair, N. J. 

HON. GEORGE VAIL, house Morristown, N. J. 

JOHN H. LIDGERWOOD, Esq., 175 Pearl Street, New York, 
house Morristown, N. J. 

JOHN LINN, Esq., house Newton, N. J. ( See letter, page 43.) 

E. S. SAXTON, Esq., 36 Exchange Place, New York, house 

Cresskill, N. J. 

J. C. HASELTON, Esq., 220 Pearl St., New York, house Teneche, 
N. J. 

CHAS. H. GENUNG, Esq., house Elizabeth, N. J. (See letter,page 47.) 
HON. JAS. B. BURNET, house Elizabeth, N. J. (See letter, page 47.) 
MRS. CRITTENDEN, house Elizabeth, N. J. 

J. M. MEEKER, Esq., house Elizabeth, N. J. 

A. H. POTTER, Esq., house Elizabeth, N. J. 

PUBLIC SCHOOL No. 1, Elizabeth, N. J. 

CITY ALMS HOUSE, Elizabeth, N. J. 

HON. JAMES BISHOP, 3 Beaver Street, New York, house New 
Brunswick, N. J. (See letter , page 32.) 

EDWARD FLASH, Esq., 52 Broad Street, N. Y., house New Bruns¬ 
wick, N. J. 

COL. A. D. HOPE, 162 Broadway, house Somerville, N. J. (See 
letter, page 27.) 

HON. ASA PACKER, house Mauch Chunk, Pa. 

A. E. W. PAINTER, Esq., Pittsburgh, Pa., house Alleghany City, 
Pa. 

JOHN BACHELDER, Esq., house Norwich, Conn. 

HENRY HOWARD, Esq., Phenix, R. I., house River Point, R. I. 
(See letter, page 53.) 

REY. C. NEWELL, U. S. N., house Worcester, Mass. (See letter, 
page 26.) 

WILLIAM STANLEY, Esq., 16 Wall Street, New York, house 
Great Barrington, Mass. 


17 


JAS. D. ADAMS, Esq., 30 Wall Street, New York, house Pit? • 
field, Mass. (See letter , page 37.) 

JAS. D. COLT, Esq., house Pittsfield, Mass. ( See letter, page 41.) 

EDWARD LEARNED, Esq., 48 Pine Street, New York, house 
Pittsfield, Mass. ( See letter, page 21.) 

WILLIAM POLLOCK, Esq., house Pittsfield, Mass. 

M. L. DRESSER, Esq., house Pittsfield, Mass. 

PITTSFIELD BANK, Pittsfield, Mass. (See letter of J. D. Adams, 
page 37.) 

E. B. BIGELOW, Esq., house Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, Mass. 

THOS. G. APPLETON, Esq., house Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, 
Mass. 

R. E. ROBBINS, Esq., house Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, Mass. 

WILLIAM H. GLENNY, Esq., house Buffalo, N. Y. 

GEORGE B. HICKS, Esq., house Cleveland, Ohio. 

Hot-Air Furnaces removed from 85 buildings. 

Stoves or Grates , “ “ 33 “ 

Steam-Apparatus , “ “ 15 “ 

Hot-water Apparatus , “ “ 7 “ 























RECOMMENDATIONS. 


New York, March 21st, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : You ask my opinion of your system of Warming 
and Ventilating, as compared with others. I most cheerfully 
comply, and if anything I can say will induce a single family to 
avail themselves of it, or any school committee to adopt its use, I 
shall feel that I have been of service to such, 

I have given the subject of warming and ventilating much 
attention, and from experience I unhesitatingly say that steam, as 
applied by your plan , is at once the most safe, convenient, effectual, 
and healthful of any or all modes of producing artificial heat that I 
have examined. 

The health of my family has for a number of years been such 
as to induce me to spare no pains or expense to secure the most 
healthful and effectual system of heating my dwelling, and I have 
used various kinds of hot-air furnaces, and discarded them all in 
turn, on account of their pernicious influence upon health, to say 
nothing of the wasteful and extravagant use of fuel. I believe it is 
impossible to construct a hot-air furnace so that it will be free from 
dust, gas and smoke, or to manage one so that it will not destroy 
the vitality of the air by passing over an over heated surface. 

Since I have adopted the use of your plan, all these objections 
are obviated. The heating surfaces are so far removed from the 
heating source, that it is impossible to contaminate the air with these 
deadly influences, and as the heating surface is never greater than 
about 212°, the air must remain pure. 

Another and very important feature in your apparatus is its per¬ 
fect self-regulation, giving out heat in just the quantity desired and 
at the time it is needed, without depending upon the servants or 
others, and thus economizing fuel, and adding to the comfort of 
the family. 

The hot-water apparatus, in its best mode of application is one 




step in the right direction. Still it is accompanied with objections 
which unfit it for domestic use. 

It is impossible, in a communication of this sort, to hint at all 
the points of excellence of the one, or the objections to the other; 
suffice it to say, that, in my opinion, when the value of pure air is 
fully appreciated, your “ Low-Pressure Steam-Heating Apparatus ” 
will as surely supersede all other methods of warming and venti¬ 
lating, as gas now does that of other artificial light. 

After using your apparatus six years, I can only add that it 
more than realizes my expectations. 

Very respectfully yours, etc., 

A. S. JEWELL, 

27 Water Street.. 

Peekskill, March 1, 1805. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen: Your improved Low-pressure Steam Warming 
and Ventilating Apparatus, put up in my dwelling in the fall of 
1859, in place of a hot-air furnace, so fully demonstrates all that 
you promised for it, that it gives me pleasure to volunteer my testi¬ 
monial of its superior merits. 

Durability of material, permanency of construction, agreeable¬ 
ness of appearance, simplicity of mechanism, ease of management, 
freedom from all danger, economy in fuel, and above all, the purity, 
healthfulness and even distribution of the air in the apartments 
warmed and ventilated by it, are, in my experience, qualities of 
excellence not to be found in any other warming apparatus of 
the age. 

A very noticeable feature of your apparatus or system is its 
ability to warm rooms at a very remote distance from the furnace, 
or rather the boiler —rooms in the extreme L of my house, some 
hundred feet horizontally from the boiler, and where my water- 
pipes have heretofore given trouble by freezing, are now effectually, 
and in a few seconds, as readily warmed as those within a few feet. 
We find your steam arrangement in the drying room, also located 
in the extreme of the L, most efficient, neat and convenient for 
drying clothes. You locate your warming surface in various stacks, 
not within the rooms, to disfigure them, but directly beneath each 
separate register, through which the warm air is supplied. In heating 
power your arrangement is equivalent to having a hot air furnace 






20 


under each room, while you obviate the gas, smoke, ashes, and 
other poisonous and disagreeable escapements, so inseparably con¬ 
nected with the use of hot-air furnaces. 

No exterior currents of air affect the operation of your apparatus 
in any way. Let the wind blow high or low—cast, west, north or 
south—the same equable, efficient, balmy atmosphere pervades my 
entire house, although built of wood, and fully exposed on all sides. 
One room in particular we could not warm at all with the hot-air 
furnace, when the wind was in a certain direction. 

The principles which you adhere to, of locating your heating 
surface remote from the fire and its attendant gas, ashes, dust, &c.; 
of having those surfaces at points where the warmth is actually 
wanted, and of limiting them to a low but effective temperature ; 
of admitting, by a self-regulating process, that amount of air only 
that is required for the combustion of the fuel, and of supplying to 
the various warm-air chambers only that amount of external air 
which the heating surfaces are capable of warming to a proper 
degree—not admitting cold or partially warmed air through the 
registers—are, in my opinion, invaluable. 

The best evidence of my satisfaction with the apparatus furnished 
me six years since, is that I have had one put in the house I have 
just built. 

I deem it a duty, as well as great pleasure, to recommend you 
and your system of artificial warming and ventilating to my friends 
and the public. 

Very truly yours, etc., 

GEO. DAYTON. 

Office of the Singer Manufacturing Co., 
Corner 15roadway and Grand St., 

New York, March 22, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co.: 

Gentlemen : As I. M. Singer & Co. entrusted mo to procure a 
suitable apparatus for warming their show-room and offices, I spent 
considerable time in ascertaining the best contrivance for this pur¬ 
pose. The low-pressure steam apparatus which you have con¬ 
structed for them has been in the most successful operation since 
the fall of 1859, and has given complete satisfaction in every par¬ 
ticular. 

The apparatus is very simple, requires but little care in its man- 






2 J 


agement, Is perfectly noiseless, and readily adjusted to any required 
temperature. The heating surfaces occupy no available room either 
in the stores or basement. Thin is deemed an important confedera¬ 
tion where apace is so valuable. 

The store of Messrs. Hiriger & Co, is an unusually cold one, being 
situated on the north-east corner of the street, with two frontages, 
nearly ull of which are glass it has two large single doors, which 
arc constantly being opened and shift. Still your apparatus has 
supplied an abundance of heat in the coldest weather, with a con¬ 
sumption of only 12 tons of coal. 

The size of the store is 00 by 2d feet and 14 feet high. 

I am fully authorized by Messrs. Singer Al Co. to say that they 
are greatly pleased with the heating apparatus with which you 
have furnished them. 

CKO. HOSS MoKKNZIK. 


Metuoi’oi.itaic Mask, Nkw Youk, March 24, 1805. 
Messrs. IiAKK.it, Smith <i, Co, 

Cknti.kmkm : The Steam Warming and Ventilating Apparatus 
erected by you in my bouse at Marnuroneclc has been used and 
thoroughly tested during the past six winters. 

It is all you represented it to he. We have had an abundance 
of pure warm air in the coldest weather, and my family are de¬ 
lighted with the comfort produced by it. i think it a decided suc- 
eess, especially as my house is one of the most exposed in West¬ 
chester County. I consider it perfectly safe in every respect, 
durable in construction, economical in fuel, and the best wanning 
arrangement with which I am acquainted. 

Yours, etc., 

CKO, 1. SENKY, 110 limudway. 

Nkw Youk, March 21, 1805, 

Messrs. Bakkr, Smith & Co. 

Cknti.kmkk : In reply to your note, asking my opinion of the 
merits of your Steam Heating Apparatus, 1 huve to say that, after 
five years’ use, I am fully satisfied with Its operation, and consider 
it eminently well adapted to the wanning of private buildings, from 
its safety, economy, cleanliness, ventilation, anil its unohtrusiveness 
to the sight. Yours tmly, 

KUW. I.KAUN'KO, 200 Madison Avenue. 



22 


New York, March 27, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : I dislike to recommend any one invention over 
another, as the ingenuity of the country is so constantly producing 
improvements, but I can hardly refuse to comply with your request 
to state my experience in the use of your Low-pressure Steam 
Warming Apparatus, as I have used it now five years, and found it 
entirely satisfactory. 

I have delayed answering your note because I presumed that 
persons who intended to heat their houses would examine all the 
various methods before deciding upon any. If you can induce 
people to examine your mode of heating, you will have no trouble 
in procuring its adoption by all those who consult their health, 
convenience, economy and safety. It strikes me that your plan is 
particularly adapted to school-houses and all buildings in which 
people assemble in large numbers, as the introduction of fresh air 
into the rooms not only heats, but ventilates, which certainly is a 
desirable improvement to all the court-houses and school-rooms of 
our city. 

There is no question but your plan of heating can be applied 
successfully to the largest building in the country. The damper 
for the admission of air to be warmed, and the automatic air-valve, 

I consider indispensable. I need not add I wish you every success. 

Very truly yours, &c., 

OLIVER CHARLICK, 

254 West Thirty-fourth St. 


New York, March 18, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen: Your Low-pressure Steam Apparatus has been 
the sole reliance for heat in our church since its erection, six 
years ago, and we take great pleasure in stating that it has given 
entire satisfaction to all concerned, and is all vou represented it 
to be. 

The atmosphere of our church is so much more agreeable than 
that of those heated by the common modes, that it is a subject of 
remark to strangers. Although the first cost was greater than 
common heating arrangements, yet considering the very small 
available space, it occupies, the small quantity of fuel it consumes, 
its great durability, and above all, conducing (as we sincerely think 



23 


it does; to the spiritual advancement of our congregation by giving 
them a pure atmosphere to worship God in, we consider it a cheap 
and most essential fixture of our house of worship. 

Yours very truly, 

W. T. MILLER, 

Secretary of Board of Trustees of the Third 
Ref. Pres. Church, 23d St., New York. 


New York, June 22, 1860. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : You request my views on the merits and demerits 
of the Steam Heating Apparatus you put up in my house, which I 
cheerfully give, since it meets with my entire approval. Demerits 
(if put up as you have put up mine) it has none, so far as I can dis¬ 
cover with very close attention during the period it has been in 
operation in my house, both in very cold and mild weather. 

The substantial character of the whole work, its easy regulation 
at the boiler, freedom from all danger in its use, good ventilation, 
and pure air, make it, in my opinion, the best heater for private 
dwellings now in use. 

I have used the most prominent hot-air and hot-water furnaces, 
have discarded both, and now feel satisfied. 

Respectfully yours, etc, 

A. A. ALYORD, 

10 West Thirty-first Street. 


New York, June 9, 1862. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : I have used your Steam Apparatus for heating my 
house two winters, and find it far superior to a hot-air furnace. It 
gives me great pleasure to recommend it to the public. 

Yours, 

GEORGE W. HENNINGS, 

76 Beaver Street. 


New York, March 21, 1865. 

This will certify that I employed for heating my house a Steam 
Apparatus, constructed on the ordinary high-pressure plan, and on 
one occasion, at least, narrowly escaped a serious accident, owing to 
a great accumulation of pressure on the boiler. 





24 


Feeling insecure with it, I had alterations made by Messrs. 
Baker & Smith, so as to make it operate on their Low-pressure 
plan. The danger and annoyance is entirely obviated, and I now 
comprehend the great advantage of their Low-pressure, Self¬ 
regulating plan over the old-fashioned High-pressure system. I 
consider their Automatic Cold-air Damper and Expansion Air-tube 
indispensable. I cheerfully commend them and their Apparatus to 
the public. 

PETER COOPER, 

9 Lexington Ave. 


Irvington, March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : In examining the different apparatuses for warm¬ 
ing and ventilating buildings, for the purpose of selecting one to 
put into a large house I was building in a very exposed situation on 
the Hudson River, I was well satisfied with the general principle 
and arrangement of the one put in by you, but I could hardly con¬ 
vince myself that there was heating power enough to answer for a 
building so large and so exposed as mine; but having received so 
favorable a report from all who had tried it, I was finally induced 
to put one of yours into my building, and after four years’ trial I 
must candidly say that it has far exceeded my expectations, both 
as to quantity and quality of heat, being entirely free from gas, 
perfectly safe, and, if properly tended, not a large consumer of coal. 
The longer I use it, the better I am satisfied with it. I can con¬ 
fidently recommend it as the best heater and ventilator I have thus 
far met with. 

Yours respectfully, 

A. G. TRASK, 

42 Warren Street. 


South Orange, N. J., March 18, 1865. 
Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Dear Sirs : It is with pleasure that I bear additional testimony 
to the superiority of your Steam Heating Apparatus put up in my 
house, w hich I cheerfully give; it meets all my expectations, and 
gives me great satisfaction. 

It will afford me great pleasure to show at any time the perfect 
working of your Steam Heating Apparatus to any gentleman who 




25 


may wish, in my estimation, the best heater for private dwelling 
now m use. ® 

Yours respectfully, 

THOMAS FENNER, 

40 Yesey Street, New York. 


Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 


New York, March 22, 1865. 


Gentlemen : In answer to your inquiiy, I would state, that 
after five winters’ experience with the Steam Apparatus put into my 
house, I find it quite satisfactory, amply sufficient to warm the 
house, and very controllable. As to the principle of your method 
of warming and ventilation, I entirely approve of it, and find your 
apparatus to work in entire accordance therewith. 

Your obedient servant, 

J. COUPER LORD, 

139 Greenwich Street. 


New York, March 23, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

. Gentlemen : 1 have llad in u se in my house your Steam Heat¬ 
ing Apparatus the past four years. I am perfectly satisfied with it, 
and I have no hesitation in saying, (in my opinion,) it is the most 
healthy, safe, and economical mode of heating now in use. 
Respectfully yours, 

WILLIAM G. READ, 

30 West Seventeenth Street. 


New York, March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Dear Sirs : The Steam Heating Apparatus you put into my 
house, after a trial of five winters, has met my utmost expectations. 

The only question I ever had in regard to it, was capacity to 
warm thoroughly the whole house, but I am now satisfied that it 
would warm thoroughly a house of twice its size. 

Yours respectfully, 

ESLEY MELIUS, 

42 Warren Street. 


2 




26 


Newburgh, March 23, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen: After five winters’ experience with the Steam 
Warming Apparatus erected by you in my house, I take pleasure 
in stating that it has given me very great satisfaction. 

Of the superior quality of the air warmed by steam or hot 
water, I presume there can now be no doubt, and I still think your 
method of radiation by pipes the best; certainly no plan that I am 
acquainted with for warming a house could be of less trouble, or 
better answer the purpose in all weather. 

Fire was kindled in grate 26th October, since which it has never 
been out, except when dumped, and I do not think it has been 
dumped oftener than once a month. 

In moderate weather like this, when in a country house some 
fire seems necessary, while much heat would be unendurable, it 
works to a charm, with very little fuel, and all the drafts and damper 
in chimney closed; there may be no steam generated, still the hot 
vapor circulates moderately through the pipes. 

I cheerfully recommend your Steam Warming Apparatus in all. 
cases where health and comfort are of more value than the extra 
first cost of erection. 

Yours truly, 

GEORGE A. ELLIOT. 


Hudson Iron Works, June 4, 1862.- 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : The Steam Heating Apparatuses you put up in 
my houses at Newburgh and Hudson have given entire satisfaction 
for the past two winters. I consider the principle and general com¬ 
binations the most perfect of any plans I have seen. 

Yours truly, 

CHAS. C. ALGER. 


Worcester, Mass., March, 1862. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

After a winter’s trial of your Steam Warming and Ventilating 
Apparatus, I think I can truly say of it that it is all you promised 
and all I expected of it. And for the following reasons I may think 
myself fortunate to have contracted with you for such apparatus— 
because your price for the work and material seems to have been 




27 


very reasonable ; because the work was well and obligingly done, 
and without extra charge or other unexpected annoyances ; and 
because of your patient and generous willingness, from first to last, 
to afford all desired information in respect to the right management 
of the apparatus. 

Yours very truly and respectfully, 

C. NEWELL. 


Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 


New York, March 17, 1865. 


Gentlemen: I have had your Steam Warming and Ventilating 
Apparatus in use five winters. No repairs have been necessary! 
It has given all the heat I have required, and I never for once have 
had to resort to any other fire for warming purposes. The heat is 
delightful, and my family have been entirely free from headaches, 
so prevalent with them while living in a house warmed with a hot¬ 
air furnace. . I have found it, too, far more economical, having con¬ 
sumed but six tons of coal during each winter. My house is four 
stories, 21 feet 6 inches by 55 feet. Yours truly, 

R. B. CURRIER, 


42 Warren Street. 


Office Hope Express Co., 

Baker, S MI th & Co. ^ Y ° EK > March 21 - 1S66 ' 

You desire my opinion and experience as to your system of 
heating. I had one of your Steam Heating Apparatus placed in my 
house in Somerville, N. J., and have tested it five winters; and I 
take great pleasure in bearing testimony to its great value and effi¬ 
ciency, giving us all the heat we need in the coldest weather, a 
warmth and heat far surpassing any hot-air furnace, with a perfect 
system of ventilation, and any servant of common capacity can 
manage it. I consider the whole apparatus perfect, and therefore 
cordially commend it to the favorable consideration of the public. 

A. D. HOPE, 

162 Broadway. 


Jersey City, N. J., March 20, 1865. 
Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : In reply to your favor, I can say I have thoroughly 
tested your Steam Heating Apparatus the past five winters, and, in 





28 


my judgment, it is the most efficient, healthful, and desirable method 
of warming; far preferable to any hot-air furnace, on the score of 
health, economy, and freedom from liability to fire. 

Should my testimony be of any benefit to you, you are at liberty 
to use this letter, or, if you prefer, refer to me personally. 

Respectfully yours, 

T. S. DOREMUS, 

7 Erie Place, New York. 


New York, March 17, 1865. 

This may inform that for five winters past I have had in opera¬ 
tion the Steam Furnace of Baker, Smith & Co. 

The heat from it is soft and balmy, and entirely free from the 
dry and parching warmth of ordinary furnaces. It appears to me 
that it must be more conducive to health. I am in every respect 
satisfied with it. 

VALENTINE MOTT, 

1 Gramercy Park, East Twenty-first Street. 


Brooklyn, March 22, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen: After five years’ trial of your Steam Heating 
Apparatus, I am happy to say it fully meets my expectations, giving 
us at all times an abundance of heat and a pleasant summer atmos¬ 
phere. It is easily managed and is entirely safe. 

I regard it as the best heating apparatus in use, and cheerfully 
recommend it to any person desiring the best and most simple 
apparatus. 

Respectfully yours, 

WM. H. MELLEN, 

102 Columbia Street, Brooklyn. 


New York, March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : After long consideration of the subject and a close 
examination of the various modes of heating houses, I finally 
adopted your Low-pressure Steam Heating Apparatus. 

As to its piactical working during the four winters of its use in 
my house, I have to say that I am more and more convinced of its 
thorough efficiency in doing the work for which it was erected; 





29 


viz., the complete warming of the house and more especially the 
large room used as a picture gallery and music hall, which in the 
coldest weather has always been most temperately and agreeably 
heated. 

Respectfully yours, 

THOS. WARD, 

No. 1 West Forty-seventh Street. 


New York, May 27, 1862. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : It affords me sincere pleasure to state that your 
Low-pressure Steam Warming and Ventilating Apparatus has, to 
the very fullest extent, carried out all your assertions in regard to 
its power, economy, and easy controlment. Having used it for two 
trying winters, I deem it an act of justice so to advise you; and the 
more especially as I was prepared to be disappointed. In fact, I 
had purchased Cannel coal to assist, by having fires in the grates. 
That necessity has never once arisen—your apparatus needed no 
help. Thanking you for your personal attention, I remain, 

Yours respectfully, 

WM. BARCLAY PARSONS, 

« 5 Hanover Street. 


505 Fifth Avenue, March 21, 1865. 

Gentlemen : Three winters have passed since I reported to you 
my entire satisfaction with the operation of your Steam Heating 
Apparatus. In that time it has never once failed to do its work. 
It appears to improve by age and acquaintance. 

It is now somewhat old-fashioned, and your recent improvements 
had no doubt rendered its adoption still more necessary for health 
and comfort. 

Yours respectfully, 

WM. BARCLAY PARSONS. 


11 Dutch Street, New York, March 21, 1865. 
Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen: After resorting to a great many modes to'make 
my house comfortable, by the purchase of stoves, grates, portable 
and fire-place heaters of various descriptions, without success, I was 
finally induced, four years ago, to place in my house one of your 









30 


Self-regulating Steam Apparatuses, and I must say that I am entirely 
satisfied. Consequently, I recommend them to all that wish pure 
and generous heat, with economy of labor and fuel. You can, with 
pleasure, refer any to me. 

Yours respectfully, 

JOSEPH WILDE, 

Ross Street, near Lee Avenue, Brooklyn. 


Brooklyn, March 18, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

It gives me great pleasure to add my testimonial in favor of 
your Steam Heating Apparatus. 

It has given entire satisfaction—it warms the house thoroughly 
in the coldest weather, and can he easily regulated to the most 
moderate temperature. 

The longer I use it, the better I like it. It has been used four 
whole winters and a good part of the winter when the house was 
finishing. It is now apparently as good as the day it was put in. 
There has been never a dollar expended on it in any way excepting 
to clean the flues. 

In all the time we have never had occasion to build a fire in a 
grate; the house being thoroughly heated by your Apparatus, and 
with a consumption of fuel not more than one half used for the 
same quality of heat from a Culver’s furnace. 

It cost me on an average about $10 a year at old prices, to 
keep the hot-air furnace in order, for pipe, cleaning out furnace, and 
puttying up to keep the gas from coming out. 

The heat produced by your Apparatus is most agreeable, and 
its superiority in point of healthfulness cannot he doubted. 

JOHN A. CONE, 

90 Remsen Street. 


New York, March 20, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith Co. 

Gentlemen: In reply to yours of the 10th inst., requesting in 
fuller terms than those already expressed my opinion of your Steam 
Warming Apparatus, I take pleasure in stating that after a test of 
four winters’ use, I consider it the most economical, healthful, and 
complete method of heating houses in my experience. 

The Apparatus is easily controlled, giving no trouble, and dis- 




31 


pensing an atmosphere unlike that of the hot-air furnace, which is 
dry and oppressive; hut furnishing a temperature more like the 
natural heat of summer. 

How strange that sensible men, for the sake of saving a few 
dollars in the first outlay, continue to make use of the common 
Hot-air Furnace, and live in an atmosphere that is certain death to 
plants, and no less detrimental to themselves; while these same 
persons will spend thousands upon a showy but useless piece of 
furniture! 

In point of economy, judging from my own observation, I will 
in a few years have saved, in the consumption of coal, sufficient to 
pay the difference of expense between your apparatus and the com¬ 
mon hot-air furnace. 

Another recommendation is its exemption from liability to acci¬ 
dent by fire, which will render it an important consideration in 
cases of insurance, &c. Very respectfully yours, 

MONTAGNIE WARD, 

130 William Street. 

New York, March 15, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : The Low-Pressure Steam Apparatus erected by 
you in my new house, has since its completion given entire satis¬ 
faction. I can recommend your Apparatus as being the best with 
which I am acquainted. Yours truly, 

J. L. BROWN, 

Cor. Lexington Av. and 62d Street. 


Bergen Point, N. J., March 22, 1865. 

I have one of Baker, Smith & Co.’s Heating Apparatus in my 
house; have used it five seasons, and find it perfectly satisfactory in 
every particular. 

My house is large, 62 by 46 feet, and two and a half stories, 
and it is heated throughout without difficulty. Steam can be got 
up in twenty minutes; the heat is very pleasant. I think it also 
perfectly safe, and do not think it extravagant in the consumption 
of fuel. 

I do not hesitate to say, that I believe it to be the best heating 
apparatus yet invented. Yours, 

N. B. LANE, 

90 Broad Street, N, Y. City. 









32 


New Brunswick, N. J., March 17, 1865. 
Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : I have used your method of heating by steam for 
five winters, both in city and country, and consider it as very far 
superior to the old method of hot-air furnaces. 

My prejudice was against the use of steam for private dwellings; 
but I find your system so easily controlled as to give no trouble, 
while it furnishes humidity enough to the atmosphere to render it 
both agreeable and healthful. 

Yours respectfully, 

JAMES BISHOP, 

3 Beaver Street, New York. 


New York, March 18, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : In answer to your inquiries, I cannot do better 
than give the following extract from a letter sent by me to a friend, 
in reply to a similar communication: 

“I have had an experience of five winters’ use of the one which 
they put up in my house, near Manhattanville, in a situation very 
much exposed to the severe north-westers which are so prevalent 
here in winter, and I can say as the result of this experience, that I 
am quite satisfied with the working of it. I had tried for four years 
an approved hot-air furnace ; sometimes being obliged to use my 
grates in connection with it—always during the high winds, of which 
I have spoken above ; and the furnace and grates together did not 
give the same amount of heat which I now get from the Steam 
Apparatus alone; the consumption of coal being from 25 to 30 per 
cent, less with the steam than formerly. 

“ As to the quality of heat, I can hardly say too much in favor 
of its superiority over the hot air in the ordinary furnace, which is 
very apt to leak and infect your rooms with noisome gas and a 
variety of other unpleasant smells: with the steam there is none 
of this, nor can any burning out or wearing away of the boiler cause 
the escape of gases which can find their way through the registers; 
the dry and parched feeling which the air has, after passing through 
a furnace, is not felt in the air fed over the steam-coils; my furni¬ 
ture does not crack, nor does the woodwork of the house shrink, as 
it did with the hot-air furnace; and though this is owing in part to 
their previous exposure to its drying effects, yet I notice the same 



33 


results in reference to such parts as, being newer, never were so ex¬ 
posed. 

“ As to the management of the apparatus, it is extremely simple, 
and really consists of only two points, viz: keep water enough in 
the boiler, and coal enough under it. The attention requisFte in 
keeping the ash-pit clear of ashes, and the fire-place clear of clinkers, 
is the same as for a furnace or even for a common coal-stove. 

“ In conclusion, I think it fair to say, that, with less trouble and 
less fuel, you can get as much heat by this plan as by any other, 
and that the quality, so to speak, is more agreeable than that of 
any other mode of warming, excepting perhaps, hot water.” 

Yours very truly, 

ROBERT 0. GLOVER, 

158 Broadway. 

New York, March 23, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : The Steam Heating Apparatus which you put in 
my store about six years ago, works to my entire satisfaction. 

Yours, 

JOHN C. JOHNSON, 

36 Howard Street. 


New York, March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : Your Patent Domesticated Steam Apparatus has 
been the sole reliance for heat in my dwelling for the past five win¬ 
ters. It has every qualification that you claim for it, yielding the 
most agreeable warmth to every part of the house, being in great 
contrast in this latter particular with the hot-air furnace which I 
previously used. It is very easily managed, is economical of fuel, 
safe, simple and durable ; and I would not now change it for any of 
the numerous and varied heating apparatuses now knowD, although 
supplied to me free of charge. You are at liberty to refer any in¬ 
quirer to me, at my house, 39 West 19th Street, or at my store, 27 
Water Street. 

Yours truly, 

C. D. VAN WAGENEN. 

27 Water Street. 


2 * 




34 


New York, 26 West 20th Street, 
March 22, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : The delicate health of a member of my family 
has, for many years past, induced me to give special attention to 
the improvements made for heating dwelling-houses. 

After discarding several hot-air furnaces, I decided to try your 
Low-pressure steam apparatus. I did this mainly from the strong 
recommendation of an old friend, who had been a confirmed invalid 
for many years. He pronounced it, what I have found it, “ the 
perfection of heat.” To an invalid it is invaluable. With good 
ventilation of pure air, it furnishes a delightful and uniform heat, 
entirely free from smoke or coal-gas, and is regulated with the least 
possible trouble. It affords me great pleasure to give you this 
testimonial in its favor. Nothing but absolute necessity would 
induce me to be without it. 

Very respectfully yours, etc., 

JOHN H. SWIFT, 

Canal Street. 


New York, March 23, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : I have had one of the Steam Heating arrange¬ 
ments of your invention in use throughout the past four winters in 
my dwelling, East 39th Street, between Madison and Fourth Av¬ 
enues, this city, and like it very much. 

Your decided success in reducing to practical effect, in this ap¬ 
paratus, the principles justly assumed in your pamphlet as essential 
to health, should commend it to public favor. 

Yours, respectfully, A. W. WINANS. 


Mamaroneck, March 15, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : Having used your steam warming apparatus in 
my house for the five past winters, it affords me great pleasure in 
testifying to its efficiency in giving all the heat I wish, and that 
of the most pleasaut kind. The working of the dampers, with the 
regulating of the steam, far exceeds my expectation. In fact, 
I find the whole apparatus so perfectly simple and safe, that it may 
be intrusted to any person of ordinary intellect with perfect safety. 




35 


I therefore, without hesitation, recommend it as the best system I 
have ever known for warming buildings of every class. 

Yours, respectfully, 

SCHUREMAN HALSTED, 

52 Murray, New York. 

Mamaroneck, N. Y., March 15, 1865. 
Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : When we built our new church, we decided to 
have the best warming arrangement that could be procured, as 
we considered the quality of the atmosphere which our congregation 
was to breathe of the first importance. After making a careful 
examination of the various modes of warming and ventilating, we 
adopted your system ; and have found that it is practically all we 
anticipated and all you promised—which was a great deal. 

We had it in operation through the coldest weather of the past 
six winters. It is efficient, simple, safe, substantial, economical, 
and, above all, yields an abundance of evenly-distributed and sum¬ 
mer-like warmth in the church. 

We cheerfully recommend it to our brethren as the best mode of 
warming all places of public worship. 

SCHUREMAN HALSTED, 
JOSIAII P. KNAPP, 

Building Committee of M. E. Church 
at Mamaroneck, N. Y. 


Office of the Continental Insurance Co., 
No. 102 Broadway, New York, June 16, 1862. 
Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : After careful investigation of the merits of the 
various modes of heating by steam, and after obtaining the testi¬ 
mony of many intelligent gentlemen, we decided to introduce 
your apparatus, and accordingly made a contract with you, on 
terms sufficiently guarded to insure the right of an unbiassed judg¬ 
ment upon it. 

Our new building, Nos. 102 Broadway and 1 Pine Street, 120 
feet deep by 22 feet wide, divided into 25 different offices, has 
been completely warmed during the past winter solely by your 
apparatus. We have used it continuously, and take great pleasure 
in stating that it fully equals our expectations. The heat furnished 




36 


has been ample, and of the most pleasant character. The arrange¬ 
ment adopted in the basement and principal story, of bringing in 
copious volumes of moderately warmed air from heating surfaces 
located in the cellar, and drawing it off rapidly through rarefied 
ventilating shafts, thus giving us constantly all the freshness of the 
external 'atmosphere, combined with the most genial warmth, is, 
we believe, the great ultimatum in the science of ventilation. We 
much prefer this method of warming to that effected by direct 
steam radiation without any special provision for ventilation. So 
long as pure air is the prime necessity of life, too much importance 
cannot be attached to this subject, and to its bearing on the atmos¬ 
phere of banking rooms, offices, <fcc., as well as private dwellings. 
The duty intrusted to you of giving us the best warmth and the most 
efficient ventilation has been fully performed. The apparatus is in 
other respects as represented—safe, simple, durable, and very eco¬ 
nomical of fuel. 

Having had so satisfactory an experience with it, we think you 
fully entitled to this public acknowledgment of the fact. 

Very respectfully, 

H. H. LAMPORT, Sec’y. 

New York, March 20, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : I have used your steam apparatus for warming my 
house during the past two winters, and it has given me every satis¬ 
faction. 

The heat is soft, pleasant and agreeable, and not extravagant in 
the amount of fuel consumed. 

It is superior to any other warming apparatus of which I have 
any knowledge. Respectfully, 

JAMES M. CONSTABLE, 

33 West 23d Street. 

New York, March 18, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : Your note requesting my opinion of your heating 
apparatus was read by my wife, who asked me if I had answered it, 
and upon my replying “not yet,” she exclaimed with earnestness: 

“ Let me reply to it.” 

“ Why, what would you say?” I asked. 

“Say!” she responded with vehemence, “ say everything that can 




37 


be said in its favor. Say that I have a chronic throat complaint, 
and that for the ten years I have lived North I never breathed any 
heated air without difficulty until last winter. Say that you can have 
a balmy June atmosphere in December. Say that neither myself nor 
any one of my five children have had a cold, or a sore throat, or a 
doctor’s bill to pay since that heater has been in the house. Say 
that I would not be without it for any money, and that a person who 
has any difficulty about breathing and don’t have that heater if he 
can get it, is a confounded-” 

How much higher her climax would have reached in her great 
appreciation of your apparatus, I do not know, but as-1 considered 
that she had “ covered the case,” I stopped her and said that I 
would answer the note myself. 

I can only add to her testimony, that I have had an experience 
with various kinds of heaters and furnaces for more than a quarter 
of a century, and that before I decided that your heater was the 
best in the market, I had made a thoroughly practical and scientific 
investigation of the subject. I felt the necessity of some kind of 
heating apparatus that would enable my wife to endure our winter 
climate. I selected your heater, and have every reason to be satis¬ 
fied with my choice. 

For its simplicity of arrangement, its facility of attention (owing 
to the automatic fire-damper and self-adjusting cold draft), its total 
freedom from danger, from fire or explosion, or any other cause, 
the perfection of its ventilation, its economy of fuel, and the softness 
and purity of its atmosphere, I have no hesitation in saying that it 
will give entire satisfaction to every one, and that it is, in all re¬ 
spects, far superior to any other heating and ventilating apparatus. 

Yours, etc., 

W. J. A. FULLER, 

51 Liberty Street. 

New York, March 20, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Genttlemen : I take pleasure in stating that I have used your 
Steam Apparatus in my late residence in Pittsfield, Mass., for the 
past four years to my entire satisfaction, having substituted it for a 
Chilson’s furnace. 

The apparatus you placed in the Pittsfield Bank was equally 
satisfactory. Your obt. servt., 

J. D. ADAMS, 30 Wall Street. 




38 


Clinton Avenue, Brooklyn, March 18, 1865. 
Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : You ask about the consumption of coal by your 
heater. I had my house, about 40 x 60, well heated last winter, 
with less than twelve tons of coal. 

We had no trouble with the apparatus, and on the whole are 
well pleased with it, particularly the superiority of steam over a dry 
heater; no consideration would induce me to change. 

Yours truly, 

CHARLES PRATT, 

1C6 Fulton St., New York. 

Office of the New York Life Insurance Co., ) 

112 & 114 Broadway, r 
New York, March 20, 1865. ) 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : We have had in successful operation during the past 
winter and a part of the winter preceding, in our office, your valuable 
Steam Warming and "V entilating apparatus, and are entirely satis¬ 
fied therewith. Previous to its introduction we had experimented 
upon several others, but they did not come up to the standard 
of our requirements. We have great confidence in our present 
establishment. A sufficient time has elapsed to thoroughly test its 
capacity, and we have no hesitation in saying that it has thus far 
proved eminently successful. 

I remain with great respect, 

Your obedient servant, 

MORRIS FRANKLIN, President. 

Leather Manufacturers’ Bank, ) 

29 Wall Street, New York, March 18, 1865. \ 
Baker, Smith & Co. 

Esteemed F riends : During the two past winters we have used 
your Steam Heating apparatus to heat our Banking Room as well 
as the entire Building. We have been well pleased with it, and I 
believe it has proved satisfactory to all of our tenants. 

I have also used one of them in my dwelling house, and can say 
that my family have been well pleased with it. 

Respectfully, your friend, 

WM. H. MACY, 

29 Wall Street. 




39 


Brooklyn, March 18, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Dear Sirs : After having tried and found wanting the hot-air 
furnace, and my family having suffered from colds and coughs 
caused by irregular heating and the gas arising therefrom, I con¬ 
cluded to have you place one of your Steam Heating Apparatus in 
my dwelling, and I cheerfully bear witness that it is all you repre¬ 
sented it to be, heating my house thoroughly at all times, at no 
greater expense than the heating of one room by the old method. 

It is now four years in use, requires no repairs, and is so simple, 
safe and self-regulating that no one need have any fear of its per¬ 
fect safety and utility. 

Its healthfulness and cleanliness are beyond question, as all who 
have used it can testify. 

The fact that it requires to be supplied with water but once in 
three or four days, and that the fire need not be renewed oftener 
than once a month, is sufficient, I think, to recommend it to all who 
desire real comfort. 

Yours truly, 

STEPHEN A. DODGE, 
Gates, near Franklin Ave. 


New York, March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : In reply to your note of enquiry as to the working 
of the Steam Heating Apparatus which you put in my house in the 
fall of 1863, I cheerfully give my testimony, and would say that 
the apparatus has worked to my entire satisfaction, requiring less 
care and attention than any heater I have ever had, the fire hav¬ 
ing been rekindled but twice from October to April, when it wa 3 al¬ 
lowed to die out for the season. 

It warmed my house throughout with a pure, healthy atmo¬ 
sphere, easily regulated for moderate, cold or very cold weather. 
In short, I believe it to be the safest, best and most durable heating 
apparatus at present in use. 

Yours, etc., 

GEORGE J. BYRD, 

12 Warren St. 






40 


Messieurs Baker, Smith & Go. 

Gentlemen : I have used your Steam Warming Apparatus for 
three winters. Having made frequent and careful observations re¬ 
specting the composition, quality and temperature of the air, as 
heated by your apparatus, I am quite satisfied that it is the best con¬ 
trivance for heating dwellings now in use. Your arrangements are 
such that the requisite quantity of oxygen is always supplied to all 
parts of the house, while there is an entire absence of those delete¬ 
rious agents, like carbonic oxide, sulphuretted hydrogen, and other 
gases which so often escape from other furnaces. 

I regard the introduction of your heater as a sanitary measure 
of much importance. 

Yours truly, 

E. E. MARCY, M. D., 

396 Fifth Avenue. 

New York, March 17, 1865. 


Office of the Citizens’ Gas Company, 

San Francisco, July 13, 1864. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen: Your favor asking my opinion of your apparatus 
for heating and ventilating buildings with low pressure steam, has 
been forwarded to me here. 

In reply, I have to state, that during the fall of 1863, I had one 
of your apparatus put in the office of the Metropolitan Gas Light 
Company, comer of 42nd Street and Broadway, New York. The 
rooms are large and much exposed by many windows and doors 
opening on the street, and while the rooms were kept at a uniform 
temperature, the consumption of coal was far below that consumed 
by the ordinary plans of heating, now so extensively in use. 

Your method of ventilation and introducing pure air in just 
sufficient quantity, I consider superior to any other method I have 
yet seen, and whilst the first cost of your apparatus is necessarily 
greater than that of many others, yet I do not hesitate to say, that 
the economy and saving of coal more than compensates for that, 
whilst the comfortable and healthy atmosphere produced by it, 
is beyond all consideration of cost. I cheerfully and with confidence 
recommend its use to all my friends. 

Respectfully yours, 

JOHN P. KENNEDY. 



41 


„ Pittsfield, Mass., March 15, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

After three winters’ experience, I cheerfully state that your 
steam apparatus gives entire satisfaction. Though our climate is 
very cold m wmter, and my house is, like most country houses, quite 
isolated, I have had no difficulty in keeping it thoroughly warmed. 

have, as you know, by a little contrivance of my own so ar¬ 
ranged that I can assist the regulator when the house is too warm 
y means of a chain which comes up in the hall, and by which I 
easily open the door of the furnace. 

The most unskilful domestic manages it without trouble. 

Respectfully yours, 

JAMES D. COLT. 


New York, March 20, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Dear Sirs : Having substituted your steam heating apparatus 
in my house in place of the ordinary hot-air furnace, I can only 
say, that after testing it for three winters, I am so well pleased with 
it that I can cheerfully recommend it to any desiring to avail 
themselves of the best system for warming houses at present known. 

Very truly yours, 

CYRUS CLARK, 

10 East 41st Street. 

New York, March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

180 & 182 Centre Street, N. Y. 

Gentlemen : In reply to your note of yesterday in regard to 
your heating apparatus, we would say that we used the heater 
during the past two winters and found it satisfactory in every re¬ 
spect, taking up less room, and being managed with loss trouble 
than anything of the kind we have ever seen used. 

Yours respectfully, 

OGDEN & BLEWETT, 

325 Broadway. 

New York, March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : It affords us pleasure to say that the steam 
heating apparatus which you put into our stores in 1863, has 





42 


proved perfectly satisfactory. The quality of the heat produced by 
fresh air passing over coils of pipe heated by steam, is superior to 
any we ever experienced. 

Respectfully yours, 

J. C. HOWE & CO., 

57 & 59 Worth Street. 

New York, March 21, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : I have used your steam apparatus two seasons, and 
am much pleased with it. I take pleasure in recommending it to 
all. Respectfully yours, 

HORACE SMITH, 

27 West 38th Street. 


New York, March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : It affords me great pleasure to say that the steam 
heating apparatus you put in my dwelling in 1862 gives entire 
satisfaction. During the last three winters it has kept my house 
comfortably warm in the coldest weather without any aid from fire 
in the grates; affording an ample supply of warm air, pure and 
healthful, free from all smell of coal-gas or other impurities. I 
have also found it very easily managed, as well as economical in 
its consumption of coal; and have no hesitation in recommending 
it as the best apparatus for heating dwelling-houses I have ever 
met with. Very respectfully yours, 

WM. HENRY SMITH, 

10 West 38th Street. 

121 Chambers Street, 

New York, March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen: In reply to yours asking my opinion of your 
“ Steam Heating Apparatus,” I would say, having used it the past 
three winters in my dwelling-house, I am well pleased with it in 
every particular. It more than answered my expectations. I 
give it as my opinion that for health, convenience, comfort, safety 
from fire, freedom from dust, for the ease and simplicity in tending 
it, and for economy in heating an entire house, there is no other 
method as good. 





43 


I have no hesitation in recommending it very highly, and feel 
confident that every intelligent person who will investigate the 
subject will come to the same conclusions. 

Yours truly, 

CHAS. STORRS. 


Before using your Heating Apparatus, I was rather slow in the 
faith, hut after using it three years with great comfort and satisfac¬ 
tion, I cheerfully and fully endorse all my brother has stated above. 

Truly yours, 

AUGUSTUS STORRS. 


The Park Bank, 

New York, March 18, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : We are well pleased with the Low-Pressure 
Steam Warming Apparatus put up by you in this Bank, and con¬ 
sider it a very great improvement on our former method of warming 
by hot air. 

The heat is more uniform, more easily regulated, and far more 
agreeable, and in our opinion more healthy. 

Very respectfully, 

JAS. L. WORTH, 

Cashier. 


Newton, N. J., Mhrch 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : In reply to your inquiries as to the operation of 
the “Steam Heating Apparatus ” put by you in my house, I am 
happy to state that it fully meets my expectations, and I am quite 
sure it far surpasses every other method of house warming and 
ventilation yet discovered, and of which I have seen any account. 

Before adopting this plan of yours, I endeavored to inform my¬ 
self of all other methods in use, and after the fullest investigation I 
could give the subject, I selected yours only on account of what I 
conceived to be its very superior merits. And I now speak with 
the most confident assurance when I say that it fully performs all 
that my investigation led me to expect it would do, and all that 
you claim for it in your circular explaining the principles of its 
operation. 










Its most striking merits in my judgment are its great economy 
in the consumption of fuel, its power of warming your whole house 
with a summer atmosphere without heating any part of it, and the 
perfect ventilation which it furnishes to every apartment which it 
warms. Respectfully, 

Your obed’t serv’t, 

JOHN LINN. 

-- 

New York, March 18, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

I would say in reply to your note of the 10th inst., that I most 
cheerfully bear testimony to the complete success of the heating 
apparatus put up by you in my dwelling, No. 18 East 29th Street, 
about two years since. I know of no better evidence to offer of my 
entire satisfaction with your heater, than the fact that after the 
most rigid examination and careful watching, I am unable at this 
time to point out a single fault or suggest an additional improve¬ 
ment. The experience of two years satisfies me that the apparatus 
answers all that a most requiring public could expect of it. As 
compared with other heaters, most of which I have tried with more 
or less satisfaction, it stands vastly superior, as well for the sim¬ 
plicity of its construction, the safety, convenience and elegance of 
its arrangements, as for the happy effects of its soft, even, and life- 
invigorating current of warm air. I therefore look upon it as a 
great desideratum in every dwelling, and particularly in a climate 
so changeable in its temperature as that of our city, and I heartily 
wish you the success your exertions and the invaluable patents you 
possess entitle you to. 

I am, very faithfully, 

Yours, &c., 

BAYARD CLARKE, 

51 Liberty Street. 


Office of the North American Fire Insurance Co.,) 

No. 114 Broadway, New York, March 18, 1865. £ 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : In replying to your favor asking an opinion as to 
the practical working of your steam heating and ventilating ap¬ 
paratus, I can state its results better by comparing it with the 
one formerly in use in this office. The apparatus you removed 




45 


was as complete a failure as could be conceived. It was high- 
pressured limit 75 lbs. The pipes were in iron cases in the 
rooms, and fed with cold air from the outside, conveyed through 
the cellar by means of tin pipes. With this apparatus the former 
occupants of the premises were quite unable to be comfortably warm 
in extreme cold weather, say from 15° to 20° above zero. Beside 
which the noise arising from it was so loud and constant as to 
greatly annoy the occupants of the office, and seriously interfere 
with the operations of officers and clerks. Offensive odors arose from 
it, and at times the water overflowed and soiled the carpet and 
floor; in summer it was of no value whatever. 

The apparatus attached by you to the same boiler and pipes, 
has had the test of two winters’ use, and in summer, and its 
results have been most satisfactory. With 20 lbs. of steam—ther¬ 
mometer at 10° above zero outside and nine-tenths of the pipe at¬ 
tached, the thermometer rose to 90°—while we were perfectly free 
from noise and effluvia. By means of the steam air-washer, we 
have been supplied in all weathers with an abundance of pure fresh 
a ^ r —without a particle of dust—making the office thoroughly warm 
in winter, and in summer pleasantly cool. 

In relation to danger from fire, we know that the high-pressure 
apparatus as often set up is decidedly unsafe. But as far as 
our examination has enabled us to discover, your apparatus in that 
respect is perfectly free from danger. In short, everything desired 
has been fully and completely accomplished, and we have no hesi¬ 
tation in recommending your apparatus for heating and ventilating 
as perfectly safe from fire and explosion, and as desirable in every 
respect. Very respectfully, 

Yours, &c., 

R. MASON, Supt. 

In the autumn of 1863, Baker & Smith put into my house their 
apparatus for heating it by steam in coils of iron pipe. 

I have now had the experience of two winters, the last being a 
severe one ; and have found the temperature throughout the house 
warm, and the air, which is constantly changed, both agreeable and 
healthful. 

JOSEPH WALKER, 

31 East Thirty-sixth Street, N. Y. 

3d Mo. (March,) 1865. 




46 


New York, March 20, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : It gives me pleasure to have this opportunity to 
testify to the entire satisfaction of the working of your Steam Heat¬ 
ing Apparatus which you put into my house nearly two years since, 
and for durability, comfort, safety and every other quality recom¬ 
mended by you, I know of no heating apparatus equal, and think 
it cannot fail to please any one who gives it a fair trial. 

Respectfully yours, 

J. M. BENHAM, 

75 Remsen Street, Brooklyn. 


New York, March 20, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : Your Steam Heating Apparatus has proved in every 
way perfectly satisfactory. I can confidently recommend it as the 
nearest perfection of anything I have met with in that line. You 
are at liberty to refer to me. Yours truly, 

JOHN F. COOK, 

389 Washington Avenue, Brooklyn. 


New York, March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Genttlemen : The Steam Apparatus you placed in my house in 
the fall of 1862, has given entire satisfaction. You are at liberty 
to refer any parties to me. Yours truly, 

SAMUEL B. CALDWELL, 

20 Old Slip. 

New York, March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : During the past winter I have had your apparatus 
in my house, in Oxford St., Brooklyn, furnishing at a moderate cost 
pure air properly heated; the economy in fuel, safety against fire, 
ease of control, and freedom from disarrangement, are qualities, in my 
judgment, not to be found in so great perfection in any other ar¬ 
rangement or system of heating and ventilating that has yet 
been presented to the public. 

R. F. MASON, 

114 Broadway. 





47 


Elizabeth, N. J., March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen: It gives me pleasure to add my testimony in favor 
of your system of affording pure artificially warmed air to private 
dwellings. 

One of your apparatuses has been the sole reliance for heat in 
my house for the past four years. My house is a large wooden one, 
and exposed on all sides. I can say no more than that I am per¬ 
fectly satisfied with it. 

Yours truly, 

J. B. BURNET. 
Elizabeth, N. J., March 17, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : With pleasure I respond to your inquiry as to the 
working and also as to the heating of your Steam Apparatus, erected 
for me two years since ; it gives me perfect satisfaction, and parti¬ 
cularly so through the extreme cold weather of the past winter, and 
I unhesitatingly recommend it to all who desire a good heater com¬ 
bined with economy and safety. 

Respectfully, 

C. H. GENUNG. 
Troy, N. Y., March 20, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen: I have used your steam warming apparatus in 
my dwelling during three seasons. 

I have taken great pains to acquaint myself with the merits of 
every description of warming apparatus for dwellings, and prefer 
yours to any other. 

Yours truly, 

P. THAL1MER. 

Troy, March 20, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : I have used your Low-Pressure Steam Apparatus 
during the past winter, which has been very severe, and take great 
pleasure in saying that it has given perfect satisfaction. It has 
thoroughly heated and ventilated my house in the coldest weather, 
aud is at all times entirely under the control of the most ordinary 
intelligence. 









48 


I mos cheerfully recommend it as altogether the best and most 
economical system of house warming with which 1 am acquainted. 

Truly yours, 

S. M. VAIL. 


Troy, March 18, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : I have used your Steam Heating and Ventilating 
Apparatus during the past winter. We have had severe weather 
with little interruption, which has required a fire kept up during 
the whole period. The fire has not been out since the 25th of Oc¬ 
tober, and yet the consumption of coal to this date has been only 
about thirteen tons of 2,000 lbs. We have made comfortable during 
the entire winter a space of 35,000 cubic feet, keeping the tempera¬ 
ture from 70° to 76°, besides using the heat temporarily in other 
parts of the house; this temperature being kept up night and day. 
This space in a corner building, as mine is, would have required two 
large furnaces, and consequently more fuel. The ventilation I 
regard as the best feature of your apparatus; the purity of the air 
discharged through the coils adds immeasurably to the comfort of 
all in the house ; this appliance alone renders your apparatus valu¬ 
able to those who value fresh air and plenty of it. 

Yours truly, 

JOHN B. PIERSON. 


River View, Troy, March 18, 1865. 
Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

My dear Sirs : I should do myself injustice, after a winter’s expe¬ 
rience of the comfort my family has enjoyed from the operation of 
your Low-Pressure Steam Warming Apparatus, did I not express to 
you my acknowledgments for the same. 

My house, which you know is situated on Mt. Ida, exposed to 
the full force of the wind, and in which two of Fox’s hot-air furnaces 
for the previous five years have at times been unable to keep the 
atmosphere at a temperature to prevent my water pipes from freez¬ 
ing, has during the past winter been at all times at a delightful 
temperature, seldom below 65 degrees Fahrenheit, even with the 
mercury at 20 degrees below zero in the open air. 

I do not know that I can say more in its favor than that it has 
more than equalled my expectations, and that I unhesitatingly 




49 


recommend it to my friends as the best method of heating a dwell¬ 
ing-house of which I have any knowledge. 

Truly yours, 

D. THOS. VAIL. 

Office of the Troy Iron and Nail Factory, 
Troy, N. Y., March 20, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen: In answer to yours of 10thinst., I have to say that 
your steam heating apparatus has been in operation in my house for 
the past three years, and given entire satisfaction. You are at 
liberty to refer to me at any time. 

Yours truly, 

WM. F. BURDEN. 


Albany, March 23, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

180 & 182 Centre Street, New York. 

Three years ago you put one of your Steam Heating and Ven¬ 
tilating Apparatuses in my dwelling-house, No. 195 State Street, 
Albany, and thus far it has done all you promised it should. 

The arrangements are quite simple and not likely to get out of 
order or repair. Any person who can make a good fire and keep it 
going can take care of the whole thing without interference with 
other duties about the house. I consider the apparatus supe¬ 
rior to any other mode I have yet seen for warming and ventilating. 
All who study their health and comfort will not fail to appreciate 
its great advantages. 

1. ou are at liberty to refer to me on this subject. 

Yours very truly, 

GEO. E. GRAY. 


New York, March 18, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : The heating and ventilating apparatus put up in 
my house gives good satisfaction, and I take pleasure in saying 
that I believe it to be the best in use for heating private houses. 
Yours respectfully, 

GEO. M. WOODWARD, 

77 Beekman Street. 


3 





50 


New York, March 23, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : We have been using one of your Low-Pressure, 
Self-Regulating Steam Warming Apparatus for over two years in 
our stores corner of Greenwich, Jay and Washington Streets in this 
city. The basement covering a space of 218 x 39 x 11 feet, and 
first floor and offices a space of 112x23x14-, we believed you 
would be unsuccessful in producing a temperature of 65° in the 
former and 70° in the latter in the winter season, and had the ap¬ 
paratus put in with the expectation of proving a failure. In justice 
to yourselves, we beg leave to testify our satisfaction in a contrary 
result—and recommend your apparatus to those wishing economy 
of fuel over hot air of at least 75 per cent. 

Yours respectfully, 

JOHN TAYLOR’S SONS, 

334 Greenwich Street. 


Peekskill, March 20, 1865. 

Gentlemen: In reply to your inquiry as to the operation of 
the Steam Warming and Ventilating Apparatus, I am glad to be 
able to say that we are much pleased with the mild summer-like 
atmosphere produced by it, and believe it superior to other arrange¬ 
ments in use, both on account of safety and healthfulness. 

Having been in use six years, it still gives entire satisfaction, 
and I would not willingly return to any other mode of warming 
my house. I think it peculiarly adapted to invalids suffering from 
pulmonary affections, as my husband, though a confirmed invalid, 
frequently remarked that he breathed more comfortablythan he had 
done in previous years, and believed that he had transferred to his 
own house the genial air of a more southern clime. 

Very respectfully yours, 

Mrs. GEORGE F. HUSSEY. 


Kingsbridge, N. Y., March 17, 1865. 
Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : You ask my opinion of the relative merits of heat¬ 
ing buildings by hot-air furnaces or steam apparatus. 

I will detail my experience of both, and give the facts, as far as 
they have come under my observation, respecting each• you and 
your friends can then draw what conclusions you like, and place 




51 


what confidence you think proper, in my opinions deduced there- 
from. 

In the fall of 1856 I had a hot-air furnace put in the dwelling 
then being erected. This was selected after careful examination of 
the various patterns in the market, and supposed to be the best 
contrivance of the kind then in use. I would here remark that the 
house is larger than ordinary dwellings, is situated on a high knoll, 
completely isolated, and exposed to winds from every quarter—in 
short, the situation is bleak, exposed, and in winter very cold 
Consequently a furnace of the largest size was procured, an extra- 
sized “ fire-pot” was purposely cast, the whole was erected in the 
best manner, flues having been left through the walls to conduct the 
heat to the different apartments. The furnace was found on trial 
not to generate sufficient heat to render the building comfortable; 
an additional furnace was therefore procured and placed in a 
different part of the building ; the two, however, were insufficient, 
so finally it was necessary, in addition, to have a fire in the grate of 
the sitting room. I would not be understood as inferring that hot¬ 
air furnaces cannot be made sufficiently large to heat any building, 
but as simply stating that these two furnaces were inadequate to 
heat sufficiently the building above described. 

We however got aloug as well as we could, by keeping fires in 
them night and day, and, with the addition of the grate, kept toler¬ 
ably comfortable. 

At the expiration of three winters, (two of which, however, we 
spent in town, the furnaces not then being in use,) there was per¬ 
ceived an unpleasant, sulphurous odor throughout the house, which was 
at first attributed to carelessness in the man who had change of the 
fires, in leaving the furnace door open; then to the winds° blowing 
down chimney, &c. Finally, it could not be accounted for; a°t 
times it was so unpleasant as to require all the windows and outside 
doors to be opened, to change the air. This continued more or less 
until January, 1861, when it became unendurable. On a Sunday 
morning of that month, all the inmates of the house were affected 
with violent pains in the head, languor and general debility. The 
fires were immediately extinguished, doors and windows thrown 
open, the domestics sent off to breathe pure air, which fortunately 
recovered them. 

The following day, Monday, the furnace was taken down, and it 
was found that the alternate action of heat and cold had expanded 





52 


and contracted the iron so that the joinings of the various parts 
had become opened, through which the noxious gases of combustion 
had entered the hot-air chamber, and, combining with the heated air, 
circulated throughout the building. As it was now deemed utterly 
impossible to exist for any length of time with comfort in such an 
atmosphere, it was decided to dispense with hot-air furnaces. I 
think it impossible to construct one that will not, in time, be subject 
to this objection, viz., opening the joints by expansion and contrac¬ 
tion of the iron consequent on the change of temperature to which 
it is exposed—the effect of this necessarily being to loosen the joints 
connecting the various parts; hence the escape of the noxious gases 
of combustion into the building. 

I would further remark, that the heated air (previous to the leak¬ 
age of joints) was unpleasant, being too dry, arising doubtless from 
its passage over red-hot iron, which depriving it at least of a large 
portion of its oxygen, renders it not only unpleasant, but in my opin¬ 
ion unfit for respiration. 

Having from the above causes entirely abandoned the idea of 
ever again erecting or using a hot-air furnace, or living in a build¬ 
ing heated by one, and yet, it being necessary to have heat in some 
way, the question arose, whether it were better to return to grate 
fires (which were troublesome,) or devise a safe and pleasant way of 
warming a building without their difficulties. 

In investigating this question, I met with your pamphlet, after a 
careful perusal of which, I concluded that if about half it stated was 
true, your Apparatus would answer the purpose. At any rate I 
decided to try it; had one put in the house, and have now used it 
for the last five winters with entire satisfaction. It completely 
warms the house throughout, including a conservatory twenty-three 
feet in length, attached thereto. The heat in the different apart¬ 
ments is nearly equally diffused throughout the building; the attic 
being as warm as the principal floor, or, if any difference, a trifle 
warmer. There has been no fire in the grates since your contriv¬ 
ance was put up, nor any required, the single fire in the boiler being 
all-sufficient to keep an adequate and even temperature throughout. 
There is but little trouble in attendance, one of the laborers replen¬ 
ishing it but three times a day, (the fire continuing through the 
n ight,) and occasionally letting on a small quantity of water to sup¬ 
ply the waste of the boiler. I deem it perfectly safe from any 
danger of explosion—at least I fear none ; nor can I conceive of a 


53 


boiler, capable of sustaining a pressure of two hundred pounds, 
exploding under a pressure of five pounds, which is all that has 
been necessary to use in this case. 

Finally, I would say that I have had no trouble with your ap¬ 
paratus for the five years it has been in use, nor has it been of any 
further expense, and that I am fully satisfied with it, and acknow¬ 
ledge that it has much more than answered my expectations, being 
naturally incredulous, and believing about one fourth I hear. 

I think this plan of heating should become more general, and 
presume it would, (being safer, more healthy, more agreeable, and 
less troublesome than any other,) were it not for the extravagant 
prices you charge for them ; about three times the price of hot-air 
Furnaces. Yet I hope you may be more reasonable in future, and 
trust when you shall have made what money you wish, you will 
reduce the price. 

Respectfully yours, etc., 

JOHN F. SEAMON. 


River Point, R. I., March 10, 1865. 
Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co., New York. 

Gentlemen : It affords me pleasure to inform you that notwith¬ 
standing the severity of the winter, your Steam Heating Apparatus 
has operated to my entire satisfaction. 

Although the furnace which we removed when we adopted your 
apparatus was of modern and approved construction, the air from 
it was not deemed agreeable or healthy for sitting rooms, and we 
therefore maintained five other fires in the main part of the house, 
relying upon the furnace for the purpose only of warming the halls. 
The quantity of coal consumed in the furnace during a winter was 
estimated to be from twelve to fifteen tons. The steam apparatus 
has required, I should say, something less than eleven tons up to 
this time. We have therefore warmed the entire house except the 
kitchen apartments with about the same quantity of fuel as was 
formerly used for warming the halls alone, thus saving the expense 
and trouble of five fires. For the first time, the house has been per¬ 
fectly comfortable during the entire season; the interior doors 
standing open as in the summer. Although we have never used 
any but the smallest weight on the draft regulator, we have had an 
excess of heat most of the time. Notwithstanding this exhibit, how¬ 
ever, I do not consider economy the primary excellence of the in- 



54 


vention. Its chief value in my opinion is its capacity to produce a 
perfectly pure, healthy and agreeable atmosphere. I have also 
observed another peculiarity in the heat which I have never seen 
alluded to, and which I cannot explain, viz., its diffusive nature. 
There seems to he so little difference in the temperature of different 
parts of the room, that the- members of the family sit scattered about 
as regardless of the register as if there was no heat transmitted 
through it. Its safety is probably its next recommendation. This 
fact seems to be known to the insurance companies, as the company 
where I insure expressed their gratification at the substitution of 
steam for hot air, when I gave them notice of the change. As next 
in order I should commend the apparatus for its cleanliness. Since 
its introduction we have never had a particle of coal dust or any 
manifestation of coal gas in the house, although we encountered 
both far too frequently before. It is evident, of course, that we can¬ 
not have anything of the kind under our present arrangement. I 
anticipated considerable trouble in taking care of the apparatus; but 
having taken some pains to learn the philosophy of it and its 
mechanical construction and operation, and having given it some 
personal attention when we commenced making fires, I have found 
no difficulty in its subsequent action or management. Our guests 
have often expressed their amazement at the genial character of the 
heat; and the absence of the parched and dry sensation in the mouth 
so common where furnaces are used, has been frequently commented 
upon. Contrary to our intention, but as your Mr. Baker prognos¬ 
ticated, we have abandoned the wood fire in the library, and do not 
intend to resume it while your apparatus works as efficiently 
and satisfactorily as it does now. I think that you stated last sum¬ 
mer when the job was completed, that you had lost money by the 
contract. Such being the case you, are at liberty to draw on me for 
the amount of the deficiency. 

Veiy truly yours, 

HENRY HOWARD. 


Bergen Point, N. J., March 22, 1865. 
Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : I received your note asking me to give my opin¬ 
ion of the merits of your Steam Heating and Ventilating Apparatus. 
In reply, I have to say, that after three winters’ use, I am fully 
satisfied with its operation, and consider it eminently well adapted 



55 


to the warming of dwellings from its safety, economy, cleanliness, 
ventilation, and its soft balmy heat, and can cheerfully recommend 
it to public favor. 

Yours with regard, 

ELISHA L. WALTON. 


New York, March 23, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : In answer to your enquiry, we are happy to state 
that we have had your Steam Warming and Ventilating Apparatus 
in use in our store during the past winter, and can bear most con¬ 
clusive evidence as to its superior merits. We have had some very 
unsatisfactory experience with other steam warming arrangements, 
but yours renders perfect satisfaction so far as tested, and we take 
pleasure in recommending it. 

SCOTT & BALDWIN, 

505 Broadway. 


New York, March 16, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Gentlemen : The Steam Heating Apparatus which you put in 
my dwelling, gives entire satisfaction, and I regard it as a luxury, 
the heat being so pleasant, and as I believe very healthy. 

Yours respectfully, 

JOHN McGEE, 

135 Broadway. 


Home Insurance Company, Office, No. 135 Broadway, 
New York, March 16, 1865. 

Messrs. Baker, Smith & Co. 

Genttlemen: The Steam Heating Apparatus which you put in 
this building, furnishes a very pleasant heat, and is satisfactory in 
all respects. 

Respectfully yours, &c., 

A. B. WILLMARTH. 







A LITTLE FAMILIAR TALK 


WITH OUR CUSTOMERS. 


In appearing before you in a new edition of our de¬ 
scriptive pamphlet, we take the opportunity to tender our 
thanks for the words of commendation and encourage¬ 
ment lavished upon us in time past. Our business has 
so increased that we are obliged for want of room to 
change our place of business, as will be seen by our new 
address. 

We now occupy a large and commodious building, 
easy of access from the great thoroughfare, Broadway, 
and have very greatly increased facilities for building 
our apparatus and exhibiting our work. Our oppor¬ 
tunities, we believe, are not equaled by any similar 
establishment in the world. 

We have recently made several important improve¬ 
ments, which, with many particulars not referred to in 
this book, will be cheerfully explained to those who 
may visit our establishment. 

In the construction of our apparatus we adhere 
strictly to the rule to allow nothing but of the most 
substantial kind. In the formation of the necessary 
joints, we admit nothing more perishable than the iron 
itself. Rubber, cloth, yarn, cement, paint, putty, &c., 
&c., which enter into the construction of apparatuses 
with which we have sometimes to compete, can have no 
place in ours; and although we may occasionally lose a 



57 


job for want of discrimination on the part of the pur¬ 
chaser between a well made and a poorly constructed 
apparatus, we believe our interest lies in rejecting all 
work that cannot be done in such a manner as will en¬ 
sure satisfaction to our customers and credit to ourselves. 

The employment of steam for domestic warming is 
comparatively new. The public are as yet uneducated 
in the details of the business. We therefore feel justified 
in venturing a few words of advice to those in search of 
the best apparatus for warmiDg and ventilating. Exam¬ 
ine for yourself the quality and quantity of the material 
used, and the liability of the apparatus to get out of 
repair. See exactly how the joints of the several parts 
are constructed. Investigate carefully the mode proposed 
for ventilation in connection with heating, and finally, 
use your own good common sense in preference to the 
assertions of any interested parties. 

Our aim is to construct an apparatus that will prove 
permanent, safe, simple and effective, and ensure ruRE 
ARTIFICIALLY WARMED AIR IN LIVING APARTMENTS. 


From a Report of the Special Committee of the Board 
of Education of Jersey City. 

It is proper to state that these heating arrangements 
your Committee examined, and report upon as above, 
are the only ones yet introduced which claim to be su¬ 
perior to the ordinary hot-air furnaces, and, as we have 
been informed, are the best specimens of the kind ever 
erected. 

After investigating this subject thus thoroughly, and 
giving it a very careful consideration, your Committee 
are convinced that the Baker & Smith " Low-Pressure 
Steam Heating Apparatus ” has the decided preference 
3 * 



58 


over any other that they have examined—for the follow¬ 
ing reasons, which they think will be fully established 
upon any trial of investigation :—the advantages are 
found in economy, durability of material and con-■ 
struction , in entire safety from explosion, self-regulat¬ 
ing, ease of management, freedom from dust, gas, and 
smoke, even and quick in operation, sending the heat to 
all the rooms at once, efficient in ventilation, and nicety 
of adjustment to any required temperature. It occupies 
hut small space, and is economical in the consumption of 
fuel. 

The heat from this apparatus, being perfectly free 
from all impurities, is peculiarly adapted to delicate 
lungs and sickly children. 

Another important feature in this apparatus is its 
entire safety from fire. The boilers are set in such 
manner that it is quite impossible to set the building on 
fire by the most careless management. The heating 
surface is so far removed from the power to produce the 
heat, that it is not possible to produce any of the un¬ 
pleasant effects that are caused by the other modes of 
heating. 

Much more might be said in behalf of this system 
of warming and ventilating, but your Committee deem 
this sufficient; but would refer to the subjoined extract 
from a lecture by Professor E. Y. Robbins, delivered at 
the Cooper Institute, on the subject of ventilation as in¬ 
fluencing health and longevity. 

Prom all the foregoing facts, which your Commit¬ 
tee are confident can be established to the satisfaction of 
every member of this Board, they recommend that meas¬ 
ures be taken to introduce a Messrs. Baker & Smith's 
“ Low Pressure Steam - Heating Apparatus ” into 
School No. 2 at as early a day as shall be deemed expe¬ 
dient. 


59 


Ventilation as Influencing Health and Longevity ._ 

Professor E. Y. .Robbins delivered the second of his 
course of lectures on C! Sanitary Science,” at Cooper 
Institute: his subject was, “ Ventilation as Influencing 
Health and Longevity.” He commenced by saying, that 
air was the prime necessity of life—that we could live 
more days without food than we could minutes without air. 
The purpose of our breathing was, first, to supply the blood 
with oxygen, which is the life-sustaining principle of the 
air ; and, second, to free the blood from carbonic acid and 
other impurities. The air which we breathe is found on 
expiration to have lost a large part of its oxygen, and to 
be impregnated with carbonic acid gas—the substance 
which often proves fatal to persons who descend into wells, 
and which is the active agent of death in cases of suicide by 
burning charcoal. It produces death whether retained in 
the blood, or inhaled into the lungs—the poisoning pro¬ 
cess in both cases being precisely the same. To produce 
death by that agent, it was by no means necessary that 
it should be breathed in its pure state. Dr. Carpenter 
had ascertained that air containing five or six per cent, 
of carbonic acid gas would produce immediate death, and 
less than one-half that quantity would soon prove fatal; 
and Dr. T. Herbert Barker had ascertained by experi¬ 
ments with this substance, that an animal in an atmos¬ 
phere containing only two per cent, of carbonic acid, 
would die in about two hours. Now, the air which we 
exhale from the lungs contains, according to standard 
au thorities, aboutJive. p er...cent of ...carLcmi 
hence i if exactly the. same air were reinhale^,. it would 
quickly prove fatal. It is a substance that is constantly 
accumulating in the blood, and, if it is not as constantly 
removed, will speedily produce death. The process-of 
breathing is but the instinctive effort of nature to free 




60 


herself from this poison. But air which has once been 
in the lungs will no longer perform this office, being 
already saturated with carbonic acid. Hence the neces- 
ity of inhaling fresh air at every breath. The impor¬ 
tance of this was illustrated by Dr. Southwood Smith, 
who said : “ Stop the respiration of an animal, or confine 
it to air which has already been respired, and carbon 
accumulates in the venous blood, and mixes with the 
arterial blood. In half a minute the blood flowing in 
the arteries is evidently darker ; in three-quarters of a 
minute it is of a dusky hue, and in a minute and a half 
it is quite black. Every particle of arterial blood now 
disappears, and the whole mass becomes venous, sensi¬ 
bility is abolished, and the animal falls down, and in 
three, or at most in four minutes, the heart entirely 
ceases its action, and can never again be excited.” 

Now, if effects are proportioned to their causes, and 
if an atmosphere impregnated with five per cent., or one- 
twentieth part of this volume, of carbonic acid, will thus 
produce death in a few minutes, what must be the prob¬ 
able effect of breathing, for twenty or forty years, even 
the much minuter proportions which must be present in 
every inhabited room where there is not a constant 
ingress and egress of air ? 

It must lower the standard of health, and shorten 
the duration of life. But not only is the air in a close 
room thus constantly being impregnated with carbonic 
acid gas to the amount of about twenty-eight cubic 
inches per minute for each adult man occupying such 
room, but there is also, according to the best authorities, 
constantly being discharged by the lungs and pores 
of the skin an equal amount, by weight, (that is, about 
three or three and a half pounds in twenty-four hours,) 
of effete, decaying animal substances, in the form of in- 


61 


sensible vapor, which we often see condensed in drops 
upon the windows of crowded rooms and railroad cars. 
These drops, if collected and evaporated, leave a thick, 
putrid mass of animal matter. The breathing of these 
exhalations is believed to be quite as efficient in pro¬ 
ducing disease as carbonic acid itself. But there is still 
a third deterioration produced in the air by respiration, 
and that is the loss of its oxygen. Oxygen is the vital 
and life-supporting principle of the air; and it is found 
that when the air enters the lungs, the blood absorbs 
about forty per cent, of the oxygen which it contains. 

# 18 u P on this we live; and the air that is exhaled 

being deficient, by almost one-half, in this vital element, 
of course can no longer support life. And as we inhale 
about five hundred cubic inches of air every minute, we 
of course deprive that quantity of air of forty per cent, 
of its oxygen each minute. The Creator has provided 
for the constant and complete removal of these poisonous 
exhalations, by causing the expired air to rise, by its in¬ 
creased warmth and consequent levity, quickly above our 
heads, and beyond the reach of a second inhalation, and 
by sweeping it away by the winds; but by our imper¬ 
vious ceilings and tight walls, we obstruct the operation 
of this beneficent law, and prevent those poisonous exha¬ 
lations from escaping. Hence the air of a close room, 
though occupied but by a single person, becomes, from 
the very first moment of occupancy, impregnated with 
these impurities, which accumulate more and more, the 
longer it is occupied without ventilation, and the more it 
is crowded. 

It certainly would be difficult to over-estimate the 
importance to life and health of the purity of the air we 
breathe, and it would also be difficult to determine to 
what period of duration human life might be prolonged, 


62 


did we, and had our ancestors always breathed a per¬ 
fectly pure atmosphere. A most remarkable and con¬ 
vincing illustration of the effects of the quality of the air 
we breathe, upon health, is to be found in the experience 
of the armies of England and France during the late 
Russian war. England, out of a total force of 93,959 
men engaged in the campaign in the Crimea, lost 33,645, 
of which number only 2,658 were killed in action, and 
1,761 died of wounds, while no less than 16,298 died of 
disease at the seat of war, and about 13,000 were sent 
home on account of sickness, many of whom, no doubt, 
afterwards died. To every one taken to the hospitals on 
account of wounds, twelve were taken there on account 
of disease. The chief destroyer was typhus fever. M. 
Boudens, surgeon-in-chief of the French army, in a letter 
written home during the war, says of this disease : “ It 
is engendered by crowding and want, either in hospitals, 
prisons, or on board vessels. The disease may, indeed, 
be called forth or removed at will.” And he adds, 
“ The fil *st remedy is pure air and powerful ventilation.” 
The greatest mortality in the English army was during 
the early period of the war j after the sanitary commis¬ 
sioners arrived, and commenced their operations by se¬ 
curing greater ventilation, the sickness was stayed, and 
finally disappeared. The great panacea was fresh air. 
In the French army, where no sanitary reforms were in¬ 
troduced, the great mortality continued, and increased, 
thus showing clearly that the changes made by the sani¬ 
tary commissioners in the English army were the sole 
causes of the decrease of mortality where they labored. 
Recurring again to our buildings here, the lecturer said : 
In our school-rooms the matter is still worse; while in 
our railroad cars we have actually less breathing room 
than the wretched prisoners in the black-hole of Calcutta 


63 


they having had about forty cubic feet per man, while 
in our cars we have an allowance of only about thirty 
cubic feet. 

In addition to this, the lighting of our rooms in the 
evening is a source of great contamination to the air— 
each gas-burner being estimated to generate as much 
carbonic acid gas as the respiration of four persons, or 
more than one hundred cubic inches per minute. Every 
gas-burner should have a ventilating tube to carry off 
the products of combustion, and convey them entirely 
out of the room, as is the case in the Houses of Par¬ 
liament, and many other public and private buildings in 
England. 

In conclusion, he stated his belief that by due atten¬ 
tion to sewerage and ventilation, the mortality of this 
city would be decreased ten thousand every year. 

In answer to a call, Dr. Halliday referred to recent 
visits he had made to the houses in this city in which a 
number of families lived together. He said that the 
Italian residents here especially were in the habit of 
living several families together in one comparatively small 
room. He also mentioned that in a single block he found 
forty five families—not a single one had a child living; 
when he asked for their children the answer generally was, 

“ God has taken them away to heaven.” This terrible 
infant mortality was caused by want of cleanliness and 
ventilation in their residences. 

From the JSf. Y. Evening Post. 

“ The usual modes of warming buildings are attended 
by many evils, which directly affect the health and lives 
of our families, who are obliged to remain within doors 
by far the greater part of the time. The entire absence 
of the means of ventilation in most cases, and the fail- 


64 


ures which have followed most attempts in this direction, 
make the subject one of the most vital importance. 
Bad air is a slow poison; that is the trouble. People 
go on taking it into their lungs day after day and night 
after night. They grow pale, their lungs suffer, the cir¬ 
culation is languid, they take colds readily; the chest, 
the stomach, the skin become disordered, and a host of 
chronic diseases attack them. A little carbonic acid 
taken every day does not kill a man. It is almost a pity 
it don’t. 

“ If a red-hot stove or a furnace destroyed instantly 
one man in every town daily for a week, there might be 
some saltation for the nation. If, instead of fainting 
away in crowded and badly ventilated public assemblies, 
people occasionally died outright in convulsions, the 
authorities would take the matter in hand, and make it 
penal for the owners of such buildings to open them for 
public use without attending to the proper conditions 
for the preservation of health. When a thing is only a 
slow poison, the age is in too much of a hurry to attend 
to it. Thousands of dollars are lavished on luxuries 
and superfluities, while the air in our dwellings is poi¬ 
soned and burnt by heating arrangements whose only 
recommendation is that they are cheap. In other words, 
our wealthiest men are too poor to afford pure air for 
themselves and families. The vital life-element is sup¬ 
plied in their green-houses and conservatories regardless 
of expense, while scions of the human stock, buds and 
blossoms of immortality, are permitted to wither and 
decay in the sickly atmosphere produced by stoves and 
hot air furnaces.” 


ARTIFICIAL 


WARMTH & VENTILATION, 


AND THE 


fetnwnt Itote %g to fwketir. 


WM. C. BAKER, 

PRACTICAL ENGINEER IN WARMING AND VENTILATING. 


REVISED EDITION. 


♦♦♦ 


NEW YORK: 

PUBLISHED BY J. F. TROW, 50 GREENE ST. 
1865. 








■ 

’ 

orl} loaoLiico h:. wi xtem-rew Iiurxdfcte igph 

• " ' . ... •" :... .v'" . .r--:; . '. . 







INTRODUCTORY. 


There is no subject of a material nature to which 
such vital importance can with propriety be attached, 
as to that of the construction of our dwellings; for in 
them we are to live and find a Home with our families 
and friends. And nothing connected with that home, 
its health, comfort, and happiness, can justly command 
the important considerations that are connected with the 
quality of the air—the element upon which chiefly de¬ 
pends the existence of those most dear to us, our wives 
and children, who spend the greater part of their lives 
within doors. Hence the artificial heat, which may 
make that air impure, becomes a subject of paramount 
significance. 

In the Sun nature has kindly provided us with a 
magnificent warming apparatus, which alone, for a great 
portion of the globe, is all-sufficient. Through the day 
he diffuses genial and equal warmth, and at evening 
withdraws to permit the cool repose of the night. He 
gives a reflective and conductive heat, with the warmest 
rays nearest our feet, instead of our heads: the quality, 
too, is at once of the purest, and always below an ex¬ 
cessive temperature. 

But unfortunately for the inhabitants of that section 
of the earth in which we reside, the sun yields a suffi¬ 
cient external warmth but a small portion of the year, 
and we are compelled to resort to some artificial substi¬ 
tute for the remainder. We have that grand luminary 



4 


and heater for a model, and the nearer we imitate him 
the nearer shall we come to perfection in the construc¬ 
tion and application of artificial warming apparatus. 

In speaking of the most common contrivances for 
creating artificial warmth, it is admitted that they all 
possess, to a certain extent, the superficial object to be 
attained, viz.: heating power. But this is in reality but 
an elementary principle, therefore we shall speak of 
qualities that are not so apparent, and leave the reader 
to exercise his own judgment in determining which plan 
comes nearest to the standard of the great prototype, the 
Sun, and combines the qualities appertaining to a perfect 
system for creating and maintaining artificial heat. 


OPEN FIRES. 

One of the earliest modes for warming, and one which 
at the present time is more universally adopted than 
any other, is the burning of wood or coal in an open 
fire-place at one side of the room. There are various 
modifications of this arrangement, dating all the way 
back from the primitive andirons, or fire-dogs, within 
an uncouth fire-place of clay or stone, to the modern 
grate with its glittering surroundings of silver and 
marble; but they, are all subject to the following objec¬ 
tions. 

1. Waste of fuel. It has been found that in a common 
open English fire, seven-eighths of the heat produced 
from the fuel ascend the chimney, and are absolutely 
lost. This lost fuel is thus accounted for. One half of 
the heat is carried off in the smoke from the burning mass, 
one quarter is carried off by the current of the warmed 
air of the room, which is constantly entering the chimney 
between the fire and the mantel-piece, and mixing with 


5 


the smoke lastly, one-eighth part of the combustible 
matter is supposed to form the black and visible part of 
smoke, in an unburned state. Some writers have even 
gone so far as to estimate the loss of heat in an open 
fire at fourteen-fifteenths of the whole. 

2. Unequal heating at different distances from the fire. _ 

This forms a remarkable contrast with the uniform tem¬ 
perature in the air of a summer afternoon. In rooms with 
a strong fire, in very cold weather, it is not uncommon 
for persons to complain of being “ scorched” on one side, 
and pierced with cold” on the other,* this is particu¬ 
larly the case in large apartments ; for as the intensity 
of radiating heat (like light) is only one-fourth as great 
at a double distance, the walls of the room farthest 
from the fire are but little warmed, and therefore, reflect 
but little heat to the backs of persons grouped round 
the fire. 

3. Cold draughts .—Air being constantly required to 
feed the fire, and to supply the chimney-draught, the fresh 
air which enters by the crevices and defects in the doors, 
windows, floors, &c., is often felt most injuriously as a cold 
current. u There is nothing more dangerous to health 
than to sit near such inlets, as is proved by the rheu¬ 
matism. stiff necks, and catarrhs, not to mention more 
serious diseases, which so frequently follow the exposure. 
There is an old Spanish proverb, thus translated : 

If cold wind reach you through a hole, 

Go make your will, and mind your soul, 

which is scarcely an exaggeration.” The current of 
fresh air which enters to feed the fire becomes very re¬ 
markable when doors or windows are opened, for the 
chimney can take much more than it otherwise receives 
when the doors and windows are shut; and thus the 


6 


room with its chimney becomes like an open funnel, 
rapidly discharging its warmed air. 

4. Cold to the feet .—The fresh air which enters in any 
case to supply the fire, being colder and specifically heav¬ 
ier than the general mass already in the room, lies at the 
bottom of this as a distinct layer or stratum, demonstra¬ 
ble by a thermometer, and forming a dangerous cold- 
bath for the feet of the inmates, often compelling deli¬ 
cate persons to keep their feet raised out of it by foot¬ 
stools, or to use unusual covering to protect them. 

5. Bad ventilation .—Notwithstanding the rapid change 
of air in the room, perfect ventilation is not effected. The 
breath of the inmates does not tend towards the chimney, 
but directly to the ceiling; and as it must therefore again 
descend to come below the level of the mantel-piece be¬ 
fore it can reach the chimney, the same air may be breathed 
over and over again. In a crowded room, with an open 
fire, the air is for this reason often highly impure. As 
another source of impure air in a house, it may be no¬ 
ticed that the demand of the chimneys, if not fully sup¬ 
plied by pure air from about the doors and windows, 
operates through any other apertures. 

6. Smoke and dust .—These are often unavoidable from 
an open chimney, much affecting the comfort and health 
of the inhabitants of the house, and destroying the furni¬ 
ture. Householders would make great sacrifices in other 
respects to be free from the annoyance of smoke. In 
large mansions, with many fires lighted, if the doors 
and windows fit closely, and sufficiency of air for so 
many chimneys cannot therefore enter by them, not 
only do the unused chimneys become entrances for air, 
but often the longest and most heated of them in use 
overpower the shorter and less heated, and cause the 


7 


shorter chimneys to discharge their smoke into the 
room. 

7. Loss of time .—During the time every morn¬ 
ing while the fires are being lighted, the rooms cannot 
be used; and there are, besides, the annoyances of 
smell, smoke, dust, and noise, all of which are again re¬ 
newed if the fire is allowed to go out and to be re¬ 
lighted in the course of the day. 

8. Danger to person and to property .—How numer¬ 
ous are the losses of property by carelessness as to fires 
is well known to all, while the less frequent but more 
distressing loss of life too well attests the danger to chil¬ 
dren, and to females thinly clad, often consequent on an 
open fire. 

Such are the objections enumerated by Dr. Arnott, to 
which we may add, the annoyance and injury occa¬ 
sioned by the unavoidable ashes and dirt attending this 
mode of heating. Coal and kindling cannot be habitu¬ 
ally brought into a nice room without injury to the 
carpet, aside from the probability of sparks of fire falling 
upon it. What careful hand can remove the ashes and 
cinders, or poke the fire, without setting afloat a storm 
of ash-flakes, which settle upon books, furniture, &c. ? 

The danger to human life by exposure to open fires, 
is too well attested by the fact that nearly every news¬ 
paper contains the sad account of death from this 
cause. We copy from a city paper two melancholy 
examples:— 

“Yesterday noon, Ellen Lynch, a child four years of age, 
living at No. 7 Clark Street, was left by her parents in a room 
with her little sister. On the return of her mother, the child 
was found dead on the floor, with all her clothes burned off, as 
is supposed in consequence of her dress having come in contact 
with the grate.” 





8 


“A child two and a half years of age, left to itself, attempted 
to climb up on the fender, for the purpose of taking something 
off the mantel-piece, and in doing so fell inside, between the fen 
der and the fire, and was thus roasted alive.” 

STOVES. 

Next in the progress of improvement come the in¬ 
numerable patterns of stoves. With the exception that 
they can be cheaply bought, and are somewhat more 
economical of fuel, their use is attended with all the 
evils of the open fire-place and grate, with the ad¬ 
ditional objections of taking up valuable room, being 
unsightly, and, worst of all, they produce some of the 
evils of the hot-air furnaces in presenting a heating sur¬ 
face, the temperature of which is sufficiently high to kill 
the animalcule of the air, and scorch the myriad parti¬ 
cles of dust floating therein, rendering it unfit for res¬ 
piration, and so dry as to injure wood-work and fur¬ 
niture. The evaporating vessel of water on the stove 
is but a poor remedy for this evil. Stoves also come in 
competition with our lungs in the consumption of the 
oxygen of the air to support combustion, and do not 
recompense us for the loss, as in the ventilation which 
we get from an open fire. 

Stoves, when the heating surface is so far extended by 
long lengths of smoke-pipe or otherwise, as to take up and 
impart directly to the space to be warmed, all of the 
caloric set free by combustion, are, of all methods, the 
most economical of fuel. 

When stoves and open fires were first brought into 
use, it was through absolute necessity, instead of any 
merits which they chanced to possess. The latter came 
in vogue when wood was most abundant, and the fire-place 
was built capacious enough to serve the double purpose 


9 


of cooking and warming. We date back but a few years 
to the first use of the grate, and the substitution of coal 
for wood. 

Custom alone has familiarized us to the danger and 
inconvenience of these two methods of creating artificial 
heat. Should a stove, for instance, even of the most or¬ 
namental pattern, now be erected in our dwellings for 
the first time, its uncouth, black visage alone would be a 
matter of unendurable disgust. But when we take into 
account, above all things else, the thousands of human 
lives which statistics show are annually destroyed by 
exposure to open fires and stoves—children playing 
within reach of these fiery fiends—women drawn within 
their fatal circle—are we not led to believe that custom 
can habituate us to the most apparent and appalling of 
evils ? 

Here is a specimen of the old familiar story: 

Ann Clifton, died at her residence, No. 43 Laurens Street, 
from the effects of burns received on Sunday evening, when her 
clothes took fire from a stove. Coroner’s verdict, “ Accidental 
death .”—New York Sun. 


HOT-AIR FURNACES. 

Of all potent inventions for the destruction of human 
life which custom has tolerated under the head of 
“modern improvements,” none rank higher than the 
common hot-air furnaces. The evils arising from them 
are so numerous and so glaringly apparent, that we can 
conceive of no other reason for their general introduc¬ 
tion than that they are “cheap.” There are other ar¬ 
rangements for warming before the public, which are, 
at least, exempt from the intolerable objections which 
are inseparably connected with these; yet these Molochs 


10 


of iniquity are still welcomed as household companions 
because their first cost is small. When we take into con¬ 
sideration the great amount of fuel which they consume, 
the injury to wood-work and furniture, the high rates 
of insurance charged where they are used, the many 
valuable buildings they destroy by fire, and, above all, 
the invaluable human lives which are being daily sacri¬ 
ficed— burnt-offerings to this system—who can call 
them cheap , although their market value may be small ? 
Men are wise in not employing them to yield warmth 
to the flowers and exotics of the green-house and con¬ 
servatory. But human plants—flowers of immortality 
—may sicken by inhaling their polluted breath, and 
wither away under the Sirocco-like blasts of this abom¬ 
inable system of heating. 

TIIEIR INJURY TO HEALTH. 

The fundamental evil of hot-air furnaces lies in the 
very limited amount of heating surface they contain. 
The air we are to breathe should never come in contact 
with surfaces sufficiently heated to char the innumerable, 
minute, dusty particles of decayed animal and vege¬ 
table matter always floating therein. 250° is the limit 
to which any surface should be heated. Or it should 
be kept at a temperature so low, that,' in ordinary 
cases, with the surface situated below, as hot-air fur¬ 
naces are, 1 square foot of heating surface would be re¬ 
quired (to give a sufficiency of heat in the coldest of 
weather) to every 100 cubic feet of space to be warmed. 
Take, for instance, a house containing eight rooms, aver¬ 
aging in size 16 feet square and 12 feet high=24,576 
cubic feet of space to be warmed. This would require 
of heating surface, at a temperature of the above limit, 
245 square feet; but a hot-air furnace of the size usu- 


11 


ally put in to heat such a house, would not exceed 75 
square feet of heating surface. To make this small 
amount sufficient in cold weather, it is necessary to heat 
it to a temperature ranging from 800° to 1,000°. The 
baking temperature of an oven is 320°; wood will ig¬ 
nite at 350°; hut what may be said of the healthful¬ 
ness of air heated against surfaces which exceed the 
burning point of wood by 650 degrees ! By excessive 
heating, the air itself is decomposed, its animalculse de¬ 
stroyed, and their innumerable dead carcasses_if we 

may so speak—are thrown into the apartments being 
heated. The effluvia of the decomposition of this mass 
of animal matter constitutes a part of the disagreeable 
odor which escapes from the registers. Air being al¬ 
most a perfect non-conductor of heat, one particle does 
not warm another; therefore the air which actually 
comes in contact with the over-heated furnace is the air 
by which we are warmed and which we inhale. 

The leakage of gases is a gigantic evil of this 
mode of heating, and is inseparably connected with it. 
A furnace cannot be cast whole, and consequently it 
must have joints, which, by the continual strain of 
heating and cooling (expanding and contracting), will 
invariably become broken,—no matter how substantially 
they may be put together with bolts, screws and cement. 
These joints come against the fire on the inside, and the 
air to be heated on the outside : consequently, whenever 
a joint is broken, the gas from the burning coal is 
drawn, by the greater current of the air rushing up¬ 
wards into the rooms that are being warmed. 

A furnace may keep “ gas-tight” for a few weeks, cr 
it may apportion out its gaseous poison in such per¬ 
petual regularity as to inure the occupants of the house 
to an unconsciousness of its presence; but a compound 


12 


of carbonic oxide gas mingled with smoke and ash-dust, 
can be detected escaping from ninety-nine out of every 
hundred furnaces that are iD operation, even by olfac¬ 
tory organs of ordinary ability. We were present, a 
few evenings since, at an evening meeting in a fashion¬ 
able Church (but too poor to permit pure air and health 
to its members), where two ladies fainted by reason of 
the above-named evil; and the entire audience, no 
doubt, were affected to the extent of a headache apiece, 
from the same cause. 

While thousands may be pining away by sure de¬ 
grees through this domestic iniquity, the public are 
only startled by an announcement like the following— 
the death of two highly valued citizens. We copy from 
the New York Times: 

“Mr. and Mrs. Sawyer, of Haverhill, Mass., died in their 
bed, on Saturday, 7th inst., in consequence of breathing coal- 
gas which escaped from a newly-erected furnace. When Mr. 
and Mrs. Sawyer were discovered in the morning, artificial res¬ 
piration was unsuccessfully attempted as a means of restoring 
life. The air which escaped from their lungs was strongly im¬ 
pregnated with the gas which they had breathed.” 

There is also an arsenical escape from the highly 
heated iron, which, too, has its poisonous influence upon 
the air we are to breathe. And this is what dealers in 
hot-air furnaces call “ ventilation ”—a trite term em¬ 
blazoned on their warehouses, as the surest decoy to 
catch purchasers. 

Danger from Fire .—Another evil of the hot-air fur¬ 
naces is their constant liability to fire the premises to 
which they are attached. The small quantity of fire- 
surface and heating-surface which they contain, renders 
it necessary to drive the fire to the highest point, in cold 


13 


weather, and in moderate weather, the lack of any reli¬ 
able control of the draft of the fire, with most of the 
heat shut back aud concentrated at the furnace, engen¬ 
ders a dangerous heat, besides causing a wasteful con¬ 
sumption of fuel. These conditions, also, produce in the 
furnace and its surroundings a heat so intense as to open 
seams in the iron and brick-work, through which escape 
fire and combustible gases. 

Many furnaces are erected without “ double tops,” or 
any separation between the furnace and the ceiling di¬ 
rectly over it. Such are condemned by all insurance 
companies, and are pre-eminently dangerous. Nor is 
the danger confined to the cellar. The hot-air flies from 
the furnace at a temperature high enough to ignite any 
combustible-thing with which it may come in contact. 
The tin-conducting pipes serve as protectors so long as 
they retain their bright reflective surface; but the va¬ 
rious gases arising from the furnace, and the friction of 
the rapid current of air, soon change the bright, non¬ 
conducting surface of the pipes to dull conductors of 
heat, the solder will melt from the joints, crevices will 
be opened, and the contiguous wood-work set on fire. It 
has long since been ascertained that the continual action 
of heat will char tin and even burn it away. The pipes 
often become broken by the settling of the walls into 
which they are imbedded. It may with truth be said 
that it is hardly possible to erect a modern hot-air fur¬ 
nace without the liability of fire. Official investigation 
proves that two-thirds of the fires are traceable to this 
system of heating, and the fire insurance companies have 
been compelled to increase their rates where this kind 
>f heater is used, while they offer a premium for safer 
modes. 

The unequal distribution of heat is an important 


14 


sanitary reason against the employment of hot-air fur 
naces in producing artificial warmth. The unnaturally 
heated air, rushing into the apartment with the velocity 
of a tornado, ascends at once to the ceiling, and, ren¬ 
dered specifically lighter than the air already in the 
room, it descends only as that may be displaced. The 
thermometer will, in a common room, indicate a differ¬ 
ence in temperature of 10° to 15° between the floor and 
ceiling. Hence the headaches, dizziness, cold feet, and 
the many indispositions to which the occupants of such 
rooms are continually subject. There are other causes 
and conditions which operate to prevent this highly ra- 
rified air from being equally apportioned in an apart¬ 
ment ; but were the air as pure as the element from 
which it was perverted, such inequality of distribution 
would be an unanswerable argument against the system. 

The same pieces of iron that form the fire-pot also 
heat the air from which warmth is derived, and these in 
the hot-air furnaces can only be located in one and the 
same place, and such locality must, of necessity, be at 
very unequal lateral distances from the rooms to be 
warmed, with the hot-air conducting pipes of correspond¬ 
ing lengths. Rarified air has a tendency only to ascend 
and is incapable of being forced any distance in a hori¬ 
zontal direction, except through the application of some 
mechanical force. It will naturally rise through the 
first openings, hence the rooms nearest the source of heat, 
(the furnace,) are unduly hot, while those more remote 
may not be warmed at all. But if at times the distant 
rooms should receive a flow of heat, there is no certainty 
of their being thus favored again, as the force of such is 
so feeble, that some capricious current of air in the 
house, or some “ ill wind” without, is sure to affect it. 
We lay it down as a positive rule, that to insure warmth 


15 


to any space, the source of such warmth must invariably 
be located directly beneath or within it. 

Unequal heights, also, are unfavorable to the even dis¬ 
tribution of heat. One warm-air duct terminating at a 
higher point than another will have the greater flow of 
heat, on the same principle that a tall chimney will draw 
better than its shorter neighbor. In hot-air furnaces 
two conditions unavoidably exist to create this inequality 
in the upward currents. One is the unnatural lightness, 
and consequent buoyancy of the highly heated air; 
the other is the one hot-air chamber supplying all of the 
warm air ducts. So, in addition to our rule respecting 
the lateral conduction of warmed air, the same equality 
of condition must be maintained in its vertical distri¬ 
bution. 

They do not ventilate. —Although the force which 
the hot air rushing in exerts upon the air in the room 
may expel it through some apertures of egress, and thus 
effect a thorough change , yet this does not constitute 
ventilation in the true signification of the term. The 
air is made no better by the process, but rather worse. 
The comparatively pure air of the room is merely ex¬ 
changed for that which is contaminated. 

Their irregularity of fire. —Subject to the capricious 
judgment of domestics, and without any self-regulating 
contrivance to check excessive combustion, the fire 
is left to a wasteful and dangerous irregularity. When 
you require the least heat in your apartment, the ser¬ 
vant has considerately raked out the grate, opened the 
draft, and put on a surplus of coal; but, when you really 
want heat, the draft-damper happens to be closed, and 
the fire clogged, and, for all the servant knows, it is a 
mystery why the fire does not burn better. 

The closing of registers and excluding hot air from 


16 


the room, does not, as in the case of a well-construct 
ed steam apparatus, have the effect to check the draft 
and deaden the fire,- but rather to increase it, for 
the greater the heat against the furnace, the more the 
draft is accelerated and the hotter is the fire. With 
every means of escape closed, and a heavy fire raging, it 
may be readily seen that the air in the hot-air chamber 
and pipes leading therefrom would become dangerously 
hot; and, robbed of all its vitality, would, in this in¬ 
stance at least , become unfit for respiration. 

The evaporating pan. —The evaporation of water 
from a vessel placed within the enclosure of the furnace, 
is but a poor remedy for the scorching of the air. The 
excessive and irregular evaporation, which is unavoid¬ 
able, is frequently more objectionable than the over' 
dried air. The moisture is only mechanically taken 
up by the currents of air that may happen to come in 
contact with the water. This does not reinstate the 
original vitality of the atmosphere, nor recompense it for 
the loss of its natural moisture. Papered walls and 
furniture are often injured, and even ruined, by exces¬ 
sive humidity from this source; and its effect upon our 
personal health is certainly a matter of serious moment. 
The visible deposit of vapor on the windows and walls 
in the kitchen, is an apposite example of the effects of 
excessive evaporation. 

Improved Combinations. —A great diversity of pat¬ 
terns, and many wonderful “ scientific” and “ philo¬ 
sophical” applications and 11 combinations” are displayed 
in each quarterly edition of this modus operandi for 
creating artificial heat. Some adopt an apologetic at¬ 
tachment in the shape of a few feet of steam or 
hot-water radiators; others vaunt themselves of some 
“ self-cleaning ” “ gas-consuming,” or il super-heated ” 


17 


paraphernalia, but they all amount to one and the same 
thing, and are subject to the same objections. We lay 
it down as an incontrovertible law, which will meet the 
approval of every candid mind that has given the subject 
a thought, that no apparatus is fit to create artificial 
warmth for human beings, whose air-warming surfaces 
are contiguous to the fire and its attendant gas , smoke , 
and dust. 

Jtemarks. —Such are a few of the many evils con¬ 
nected with the use of modern hot-air furnaces; and 
yet, because their first cost is small, they are more uni¬ 
versally used, in America, than any other heater that 
sends its heat up from below. But their employment is 
peculiarly an American institution. Intelligent for¬ 
eigners attribute our bad health and complexions to their 
use. It is to be sincerely hoped that as the public be¬ 
comes enlightened on the subject of artificial warmth, 
and the laws of health relating thereto; and as less ob¬ 
jectionable modes of heating are brought within its 
reach, this unnatural arrangement will be consigned for¬ 
ever to oblivion. 

HOT-WATER FURNACES. 

For want of proper knowledge in the adaptation 
of steam for warming purposes, especially for domestic 
use, the hot-water, or more properly the warm-water ap¬ 
paratus has been resorted to by many as a remedy for 
the evils of the hot-air furnace. 

Their merits consist in their being directly opposite 
in all their features to the hot-air furnace; and their 
demerits are that these opposite features amount to ex¬ 
tremes. Their sins are rather of omission than commission. 
The heat they yield—so far as it goes—is of an agreeable 


18 


and healthy kind. But the cold breath of winter does 
not agree with them, as the many inefficient members of 
this family now laid aside bear conclusive testimony. 
It has been properly styled “ a warm-weather heater.” 
The most approved patterns do, however, give heat 
enough except in very cold weather. 

The hot-water apparatus is not of modern origin; it 
has been more or less in use almost from time immemo¬ 
rial. Its ancient usage was confined more particularly 
to green-houses, graperies, &c., &c. In this department 
it possesses some decided virtues. The warming surface in 
this case (usually consisting of four-inch cast-iron pipes) 
is placed directly within the space to be warmed, extend¬ 
ing its entire length. The surface being ample, and the 
large body of water circulating freely through the pipes, 
an even temperature is maintained. This temperature 
can, by careful firing, with an ample supply of heating 
surface, be graduated to the requirements of most con¬ 
ditions of the external atmosphere. But this nicety of 
modification to any required temperature implies a skil¬ 
ful and ever-watchful gardener and fireman. 

For warming private residences the pipes are gener¬ 
ally smaller, and are located in the cellar, in the same 
position as the hot-air furnace. The air being but mod¬ 
erately heated, the pipes conducting it into the rooms 
are necessarily very large. The same necessity requires 
the heating surface to be very extensive, and consequent¬ 
ly to occupy a large space, and involves a heavy expense 
in its construction. 

Owing to a large body of water being heated, the 
apparatus is very slow in getting up its heat, but, as a 
partial recompense for this defect, it is equally slow in 
parting with it. Water is one of the best retainers or 
bottlers-up of heat, which fact argues against its effi- 


19 


ciency as a heating agent—at least against its rapidity 
of operation. 

Liability of freezing .—One of the most serious ob¬ 
jections against this mode of warming, is the constant lia¬ 
bility to freeze. So long as the whole body of water in 
the pipes is kept in circulation, this cannot, of course, oc¬ 
cur. But the fire, which disturbs the equality of tem¬ 
perature in the water and causes it to circulate, is liable, 
through neglect or otherwise, to go out. Or if the fire 
be quite low, it may not cause a circulation, owing to the 
friction of water against the immense surface. The 
water always remaining in the pipes, and often remote 
from the fire—its exposedness to the out-door inclemency 
by means of a large cold-air box—the force with which 
the inward current is impelled against the pipes—these 
circumstances combine to increase the liability of the 
water to congeal. 

There is usually a damper in the cold-air box by 
which the out-door cold maybe excluded, but its adjust¬ 
ment depends upon the servant, who, if careless enough 
to neglect the fire, would certainly fail to attend to 
this. 

The high-pressure form of water furnace .—This 
is an arrangement whereby the heating pipes run 
through the house and are coiled directly within the 
various apartments. to be warmed. It is the inven¬ 
tion of Mr. Perkins, formerly of Massachusetts, but now 
of London, England. It is now nearly obsolete in the 
United States, although it was once adopted here to a 
limited extent. Some of the apparatus of Mr. Perkins are 
made to operate under a pressure of four thousand lbs. 
to the square inch. This plan possesses all the objec¬ 
tionable features of the other, with some additional 
ones. 


20 


Its liability to freeze is not as great, but the re 
suits are more disastrous. Where the pipes run to any 
considerable height, the hydraulic pressure on the lower 
part of the apparatus is very great; this, with the amount 
of expansion and contraction by heating and cooling of 
long lengths of pipe, creates a liability of leakage from 
the numerous joints, stop-valves, &c., which in nice rooms 
would be inadmissible. Such a large volume of water, 
extending, as it does, from cellar to garret, would, in a 
case of breakage, flood the house and furniture to their 
ruin. 

No ventilation is produced by this system ; and tho 
coils in the rooms have to be covered by screens which 
take up valuable space and are not very ornamental. 

Inequality of temperature of warm-water heating 
surfaces. —As the water in the tubes may have a gradu¬ 
ation in its temperature, all the way from 32° the freez¬ 
ing point, to 212° the boiling point, it is impossible for 
it to maintain an effective heating surface against the 
ever-changing temperature of the out-door air which is 
drawn against it to be heated. We have in another 
place given a rule that the temperature of the surface 
against which air is to be warmed should hold the same 
against whatever change that air may be subject to, and 
the correctness of this rule we think must be obvious to 
all who have given the subject any thought. The cutting 
properties of an instrument become diminished as its 
edge is impaired; so with warm-water warming surfaces, 
the cold breath of winter blows over them, blunts their 
heating force—and a cold house and a cold day come to¬ 
gether. Water may be any where in the scale of tempera¬ 
ture from tepid or luke-warmth to boiling, and be warm 
or hot water still; while steam (as an opposite example) 
cannot exist at a lower temperature than 212°—a very 


21 


effectual heating point. Even with the heating surface 
abundant, and the fire in good condition, the cold air 
will lower the temperature of the pipes to a very inef¬ 
fectual point, and these conditions may be less favorable 
to an extent to admit of freezing, even while the water 
is travelling on its sluggish course. But steam apparatus 
with boilers properly proportioned to the heating pipes, 
keeps them fully supplied with steam, and the tempera¬ 
ture of the surfaces is not at all diminished, let the air 
that comes against them be a 3 it may. 

Heat given of to no purpose .—Water being an ex¬ 
cellent retainer of heat, as indicated by the long time 
required after the fire is built to make the heat available, 
and, consequently, equally tardy in parting with it, there 
is a decided loss in warming school-houses, churches, 
stores, and all places where warmth is required only a 
limited portion of the time. 

For instance, a building requires warming but six 
hours out of the twenty-four; to do that with a water 
apparatus the fire must be built eight hours before the 
building is used. Now a good steam apparatus (a part of 
whose small body of water is converted into steam (212°) 
in a few minutes) is capable of warming the apartments 
sufficiently in two hours; consequently, it has but two 
hours to give off its heat to no account when the fire is 
allowed to go out, and warmth is not required; while 
water, with an excess of six hours in the commence¬ 
ment, has the same length of time (six hours) to waste 
its heat. This feature in the water apparatus, togethe r 
with the lack of self-control to the fire, accounts for its 
extravagant consumption of fuel. 

Its principal merits consist in the opposite conditions 
to hot-air furnaces in respect to extent and temperaturo 
of the heating surfaces. 


The mongrel form of water furnace is a jombinafcion 
of surfaces heated by hot water, steam, and the fire itself. 
In some arrangements the last-named agent predomi¬ 
nates ; in others, the second. In one instance the air to 
be warmed, after passing over the red-hot surfaces of the 
hot-air part, is cooled or tempered against a meagre 
amount of water or steam surface; in another, it more 
properly passes first over the water surfaces, and after¬ 
wards over the steam surfaces. 

Another contrivance is,'sections of cast-iron hexag- 
onal-shaped flues, stacked together directly over the 
fire. Within these flues are sometimes placed strips of 
thin sheet iron, with a view of conducting the heat more 
rapidly from the actual heating surfaces. This appa¬ 
ratus has a steam chamber, blow-off valve, etc., and would 
more properly come under the head of steam heating. 
The air is drawn simultaneously over steam and water 
surfaces, and then against the bricks by which the whole 
is enclosed. The air warmed by this process is mixed 
up with a deleterious compound of water-heat, steam- 
heat, and smoke, ashes, gas, and other poisonous resultants 
of leakages from the fire-pot and fire-chamber. This 
system, besides its similarity to the hot-air furnace in 
collecting within its heating compartments the residuums 
of ordinary combustion, possesses a more dangerous 
feature in its confined steam than any steam apparatus 
now before the public. But so long as it goes under 
the pacific cognomen of u hot-water furnace.” its true 
character will not be generally understood. 

The evils of locating heating surfaces contiguous to the 
fire are most apparent. As we stated, in speaking of 
hot-air furnaces, the partition dividing the fire from the 
hot-air chamber will unavoidably become warped and 
broken. Whether it consists of brick, stone, or iron, 


the continuous action and reaction of excessive heat 
will soon break the joinings sufficiently to allow the 
escapement of gas, smoke, and ashes from the fire, to 
find their way into the hot-air chamber. 

This evil exists to an inadmissible extent in nearly 
every heating apparatus yet erected, and is particularly 
flagrant in the above-named device. We think every in¬ 
telligent mind will coincide with us on this point—that 
even the liability of leakages from the fire into the air 
we are expected to breathe, should not exist. 

In point of durability , the water apparatus is de¬ 
fective when its heating surfaces consist of cast-iron 
tubes or sections. This is owing to the impracticability 
m foundries of casting even thickness in “corework.” 
The adjustment of “ cores ” for a great number of pieces, 
especially if they are of considerable length, and the 
maintenance of their positions during the process of cast¬ 
ing, may be laid down as one of the impossibilities of 
the trade. Even should the core remain in its place, 
the fused metal in the progress of pouring and cooling 
must, from well known practical reasons, attain an ine¬ 
quality both in surface and texture. Thus alternately 
thick and thin, soft and hard spots will occur in this 
species of foundry work. 

Tubes, or other cast-iron devices for heating pur¬ 
poses, are usually put together with cement, lead, cloth, 
India-rubber packings, or some cxydizing preparations. 
Through the constant strain caused by heating and cool¬ 
ing, expanding and contracting, these joints will, sooner 
or later, become broken, or some of the more brittle por¬ 
tions of the surfaces themselves will crack, and leakage 
is the inevitable result. 

Miscellaneous objections .—By using a large quantity 
of water, with no provision for drawing it off, sediment 


24 


and mineral deposits will accumulate, and gradually im 
pair the efficiency of water-warming tubes. 

The very large amount of heat:.ng surface which they 
present to the air, is objectionable from the dust and 
refuse matter continually accumulating thereon. 

Hot-water operators find it impossible to keep the 
water just at its boiling and most available point, with¬ 
out its escaping in steam or overflowing; and the con¬ 
trol of the draft to the fire in conformity with the heat 
required, has not yet been accomplished by them. 

Experience does not prove that any form of hot- 
water apparatus is other than wasteful in the consump¬ 
tion of fuel. 


LOW-PRESSURE STEAM HEATING, 


It is acknowledged by all those who are acquainted 
with the nature of steam, that it is at once the most 
efficient, manageable, and economical of all agents for 
communicating and distributing artificial warmth. It 
occupies the same superiority of position in the heat¬ 
ing department that illuminating gas does in the de¬ 
partment of artificial light. Being of about the specific 
gravity of gas, and of an elastic and volatile nature, it 
is peculiarly calculated to flow to the desired point, 
even through long and circuituous sections of small 
pipes. It expands seventeen hundred fold over the 
bulk of water from which it is generated, and, in re¬ 
turning to water, imparts one thousand degrees of heat 
to the air, which in water and in an uncondensed state 
would be latent and unavailable. It admits of the most 
compact form, both as regards the space occupied for its 
generation, and the surface to heat the air. 

To construct a steam apparatus that shall be effi¬ 
cient, reliable in mechanical detail, and at the same time 
simple, substantial, economical, healthful, and perfectly 
safe, even in the hands of a common domestic—this is 
the great desideratum. 

COST OF CONSTRUCTION. 

A proper low-pressure steam apparatus cannot, if 
constructed of material of suitable durability, compete 


26 


in point of first expense , with hot-air furnaces, high 
steam, or any form of warming where a small amount of 
surface {by being over-heated) is rendered capable of 
warming a large amount of air. 

Where the temperature of the heating surface (which 
surface is the principal item of expense) is limited to a 
low and healthy quality, of course a larger quantity must 
be furnished than where the surface is heated to a much 
higher degree. The expense in the latter instance is 
materially lessened at the expense of health and safety. 
The same principle applies to the boiler that generates 
the steam. 

If it be stinted in size and of small capacity, it will 
require frequent attention, be extravagant in the con¬ 
sumption of fuel, and furnish an irregular and unreliable 
auantity of steam. But in comparison with hot-water, 
or any apparatus which has a superfluous amount of 
heating surface—surface whose temperature is unwar¬ 
rantably below the healthy point—the low-pressure plan 
can “ under-bid ”—the same space to be warmed, and all 
other things being equal. 

SAFETY FROM EXPLOSION 

To those not conversant with steam and its adapta- 
lility to domestic warming, the question naturally arises 
as to its safety when thus applied. The idea of “ ex¬ 
plosion ” is invariably associated with the mention of 
steam boilers. In every instance where an explosion 
has occurred, steam was confined under a very heavy 
pressure; a large quantity was in the boiler, and that, 
for want of water, in immediate contact with an im¬ 
mense red-hot generating surface, with a fierce fire 
raging at the same time. With a proper low-pressure 



27 


apparatus, there will be, at all times, a directly oppo¬ 
site condition of things. Instead of steam being under 
the pressure of 50, 75, or 100 lbs. per square inch, its 
highest possible pressure will not eiceed one-tenth of 
the lowest of these figures, while every part of the ap¬ 
paratus is capable of sustaining a pressure of twice the 
amount of the highest figures. Instead of there being, 
for example, a million volumes of steam on hand at any 
time, one hundred would be the excess. Instead of the 
fire being driven to its highest pitch of intensity (but low- 
est poiut of economy) with a rapid draft, it burns very 
slowly, to a degree, and with a draft just sufficient to in- 
sure perfect and economical combustion. 

1 o supply water to the boiler requires no more care 
and skill than to the tea-kettle on the range, and its ne¬ 
glect would involve no more disastrous results. 

But should a “ bursting ” happen at this low pressure, 
its consequences, compared with high steam, would be 
about as serious as the bursting of a pop-gun compared 
with that of a heavy piece of ordnance. 

Steam, in the proper form for warming purposes, is 
even less dangerous than common illuminating gas. Dur- 
ing eight years of constant experience in applying steam 
to private dwellings for warming purposes, and out of some 
three hundred instances where steam has been thus ap¬ 
plied, the author has not known of a single accident from 
explosion, fire, or otherwise, where personal safety was at 
stake. Who can say as much of gas—not mentioning 
camphene, burning-fluid, and other dangerous substitutes ? 
(See remarks on high steam, page 35.) 

SAFETY FKOM FIRE. 

There is a prevalent ignorance on this subject, even 
among men whose official positions ought to lead them 


28 


to more extensive information. We will admit that 
steam has been known to set fire to buildings—water 
has done the same under like conditions. It is not the 
hind of apparatus, whether hot-air, hot-water, steam, or 
any other thing, that involves a dangerous condition 
from fire, but the quantity of caloric or heat with such 
apparatus or thing evolves. Ice , could it be heated to 
an equal temperature, would ignite whatever it came 
in contact with as readily as a red-hot iron bar. It is 
the temperature of the surface, let it be what it may, 
that implies danger from fire. That temperature, in the 
use of steam, generally depends upon the pressure which 
the pipes or radiators sustain, their thickness, the kind 
of material of which they are constructed, &c., &c. 
Yet pressure is not always necessary to produce high 
temperature in steam; by superheating, it may be in¬ 
creased to almost any extent. Steam in its native and 
unconfined state, is a most effectual agent for extinguish¬ 
ing fire. 

The following table shows, in round numbers, the 
temperature of steam under different pressures:— 

At the natural pressure of the atmosphere 
boiling point, 212° 


At 

1 lb. pressure 

above do. 

212° 

n 

5 lbs. 

ll 

ii 

228° 

u 

10 

u 

ll 

ii 

241° 

It 

15 

it 

(The limit of a healthy temper¬ 
ature for any heating si -face.) 

251° 

ll 

20 

ll 

U 

ii 

260° 

ll 

25 

ll 

« 

u 

269° 

u 

30 

ll 

ll 

a 

276° 

it 

35 

ll 

It 

it 

283° 

It 

40 

ll 

ll 

u 

289° 

it 

45 

ll 

ll 

(( 

295° 


29 


At 

50 

lbs. 

pressure above 

301° 

tt 

55 

a 

a 

tt 

306° 

tt 

60 

it 

u 

tt 

311 c 

tt 

65 

It 

it 

u 

315 c 

a 

70 

it 

Bread bakes 
tcerches. 

and wood 

320 c 

tt 

75 

U 

It 

It 

324° 

it 

80 

It 

it 

tt 

328° 

tt 

85 

It 

It 

tt 

332° 

u 

90 

It 

ft 

tt 

335° 

u 

95 

a 

It 

a 

339° 

(t 

100 

it 

tt 

tt 

342° 


Thus it will be seen that the danger from fire in the 
use of steam depends altogether upon the temperature 
of the pipes in which it is confined, and that temperature 
(in common use) depends upon the amount of pressure 
of steam in those pipes. We can refer to a thousand 
instances where pipes containing low-pressure steam are 
lun in every point of contact with wood, shavings, paper, 
and the most inflammable substances, and, after many 
years’ use in such positions, they have not yet caused 
even “ the smell of fire.” The Board of Fire Insurance 
Companies of New York has recently decided this ques¬ 
tion in favor of low-pressure steam, and agrees to make 
a deduction of ten per cent, on all risks where it is ex¬ 
clusively employed for warming. 

SELF-KEGULATION. 

This is the most important feature in the construc¬ 
tion of a proper warming apparatus. All of the most 
3ommon artificial heaters of the present day are without 
any such arrangement, and are unable to have it, for 
want of some available mechanical force. Steam is pe¬ 
culiarly calculated to effect this object, as the small 
amount of power requisite is easily applied, by a very 


30 


simple mechanical contrivance, to shut Dff and reverse 
the draught to the fire, and to prevent any possible ac¬ 
cumulation of steam beyond the desired limit, even 
more perfectly than an intelligent being, constantly in 
attendance, could possibly do. 

It is evident that the fire should burn, and the fuel 
be consumed, only in proportion as heat is required. 
The quantity of heat thrown off from the heating sur¬ 
face depends upon the quantity of steam it condenses; 
and the extent of this condensation depends entirely 
upon the amount and temperature of the air coming in 
contact with the surface to be warmed. Thus, when a 
large amount of cold air is brought against the heating 
or radiating surface, the condensation is rapid, a large 
quantity of heat is evolved, the steam used fast, the 
pressure diminished, the draft opened, and the consump¬ 
tion of fuel increased. On the other hand, if the air to 
be warmed is taken against the surface at a higher tem¬ 
perature, or the quantity diminished by its ingress being 
shut off from any room, the condensation is diminished, 
less steam is used, the pressure increased, the draft 
closed, and the fire checked to any given requirement. 

By this arrangement, it will be seen that steam is the 
agent for the regulation of the fire that generates it. This 
is all-important, as the fire is the prime mover, and no 
steam or heat can exist without it. On this feature de¬ 
pend safety, economy in fuel, general convenience and 
healthfulness. Without it no apparatus is complete, and 
no steam apparatus admissible. The mechanical construc¬ 
tion of such an arrangement must needs be of the most 
simple, substantial, and reliable kind, and proof against 
*my contingency. 


31 


ECONOMY IN FUEL. 

A perfect regulation and control of the draft, causing 
the fire to burn only as the demand for heat is required, 
and invariably checking it when that demand is met; 
the water from the condensed steam, still hot, running 
back by its own gravity to the boiler, being constantly re¬ 
converted into steam, with only an incidental waste_ 

and, consequently, not drawing upon the fire to heat cold 
water;—the proper construction of the boiler to insure 
the most perfect combustion, and a full absorption of the 
caloric of the fuel in the generation of steam—are the 
principal conditions on which the consumption of fuel 
depend, and these are all maintained in this apparatus to 
a degree of economy not equalled by any other. 

By practical experience, the author is convinced that 
m the use of a properly constructed low-pressure appa¬ 
ratus, under like circumstances, only one-half the amount 
of fuel will be consumed that would be by a common hot¬ 
air furnace, and nearly the same ratio will hold good in 
comparison with hot water and high steam. 


LIABILITY TO FREEZE. 

This evil, which is such a serious one in the use of 
the hot-water apparatus, scarcely exists in this. Steam, 
of course, cannot congeal, and the water resulting from 
condensation, running back to the boiler through warm 
pipes, certainly will not. But should the cold air duct be 
left open, the fire being nearly out, and only steam enough 
made to partially fill the exposed surfaces, the frost will 
get the ascendancy to such an extent as to congeal tho 
water resulting from condensation before it can make its 
way back to the boiler. 





32 


Therefore the draft of air through our cold-air duct to 
the heating surface is regulated by a damper operated by 
the pressure of steam, and is proportionate to the amount 
required to be heated, and the capacity of the surface at 
the time for heating the air. Whenever the fire and 
steam go down, this damper will be invariably closed, and 
the cold external air shut off from the heating surface. 
If but a part of the surface is filled with steam, or the in¬ 
gress of warmed air into the room is stopped by the clos¬ 
ing of registers, a corresponding amount of air will be 
admitted. Thus it will be seen that this arrangement not 
only secures an even temperature to the air warmed, but 
prevents the liability of freezing from this source. 

QUICKNESS OF OPERATION, AND STEADI¬ 
NESS OF HEAT. 

Having but a small quantity of water to heat, and a 
large fire-surface wherewith to heat it, steam is quickly 
generated and distributed through the heating surface. 
From fifteen to twenty minutes usually will suffice “ to 
get up steam ” and make the heat available. 

These conditions also insure a steadiness of heat. By 
an ample fire-surface against a small body of water, the 
fuel is enabled, by burning at its very lowest point of 
combustion , to keep up the required head of steam; and 
this point is maintained by the control of the draft over 
the fire. Thus steam, and consequently heat, is kept 
up so long as there is any fire. 

In this particular it has been claimed that the hot- 
water furnace is peculiarly meritorious, especially for 
green-hooses (though we do not admit that steadiness of 
heat and equality of temperature are more essential to 
the -well-being of plants than they are to persons); that 


33 


a large body of water, it maintains its beat a long 
while after the fire goes out. This is true; but if it 
maintains it a long while after the fire goes out, it retains 
it equally long when the fire is first built. On the 
other hand, steam is generated with the kindling of the 
fire, and goes down when the fire goes out. In this 
respect we claim a superiority for steam, for it is usually 
most desirable to have heat when the fire is built, and 
to dispense with it whenever the fire burns away, or is 
extinguished. Both systems create heat equally while 
the fire is burning, but the difference is at the start and 
at the terminus. One withholds it from being available 
at first, to give it off leisurely after the other has ac¬ 
complished its duty. In the aggregate both systems 
evolve the same amount of heat under like conditions. 
The difference is only a matter of time. 


FREEDOM FROM NOISE. 

In the high-pressure form of heating, the noise oc¬ 
casioned by the collision of condensed water and steam 
being driven against each other, is very objectionable. 
The sound resembles the tapping of a hammer, and is 
continually kept up where long lengths of small lateral 
pipes are employed. In factories, workshops, and on 
steamboats, this noise may be admissible, but in private 
dwellings, schools, &c., never. Iron pipes, especially 
large ones, run to the different rooms of a dwelling, are 
objectionable in being such good conductors of sound. 
The least rattle of coal or other noises at the boiler, can 
be heard quite as distinctly in some distant room as 
where it occurred. Neither of these undesirable features 
exists in this plan. The pipes are so arranged, and of 
sufficient size, and the pressure in them so slight, that 




34 


the flow of the steam upwards, and of water downward^ 
is free and noiseless. 

SIMPLICITY AND EASE OF MANAGEMENT. 

To have a heating apparatus—especially one that 
otherwise would be dangerous—simple and substantial 
in its construction, not liable to get out of repair, and 
entirely secure in the care of common domestics, is in¬ 
dispensably essential. This apparatus combines these 
necessary features. The fire requires to be fed, to keep 
up an even supply of heat, but twice in twenty-four 
hours. A fresh fire will seldom need to be built. 

There are usually no valves whose adjustment 
depends upon the care and judgment of any one. Only 
the simple and all-important items of fuel and water are 
required to be supplied. The supplying of these must , 
under any circumstances, rely upon human intelligence. 
No contrivance, though it be as perfect as mechanical 
skill can construct, is infallible , therefore none should 
be intrusted to fulfil this indispensable duty. The habit 
of the common domestic in the kitchen, of supplying 
with punctilious regularity, every morning, the water to 
the tea-kettle, and the fuel to the stove, amply qualifies 
her to attend to this duty—no more skill, judgment, or 
trouble is required in one case than in the other. 

The simple act of shutting off or letting on the heat, 
by turning the registers, whenever agreeable to the 
occupants of any part of the house, does, of itself, regu¬ 
late the fire, the accumulation of steam, and the amount 
of air to be warmed, as before explained. 

DURABILITY. 

Where a considerable expense, as well as some 
trouble is involved, we want, besides the assertion of 


35 


“ for value received,” some other assurance of durabil¬ 
ity, and that what we buy will, besides appearing all 
right, be in reality of some lasting benefit. This is 
particularly desirable in a heating apparatus which is 
put into a private dwelling. Outside of the first cost, 
its erection is attended with more or less inconvenience 
and annoyance to the inmates. Some tearing away, 
altering and repairing of wood-work, brick, stone, &c., 
is also implied in the operation. 

The simple fact that this apparatus is capable, in all 
its parts, of sustaining a pressure of two hundred pounds 
to every square inch, must be proof abundant and ap¬ 
parent of its durability. In short, the boiler, heating 
surface, and all the appurtenances connected, will last 
and hold good at least the average life-time of man. 


HIGH-PRESSURE STEAM-HEATING. 

We will briefly speak, by way of comparison, of a 
system of steam-heating which is directly opposite in all 
its features to the one we have been considering. 

Most persons have but a superficial knowledge of 
steam, and of course are ignorant of its different forms 
of application, both as an agent for heating purposes 
and as a motive power. All are familiar with the sight 
of the long lengths of small pipes running beneath the 
seats of steamboats, and around the rooms of factories 
and many other large buildings. This is the high- 
pressure application of steam-heating, and has been in 
vogue for a great many years. 

The steam is generally supplied to these pipes from 



36 


the same boiler that furnishes steam to drive the engine, 
and they are subject to the same heavy pressure. This 
plan is a convenient one where a steam engine is re- 
quired. but the objections to it make it hardly admissi- 
ble under other circumstances. 

Disagreeable Noise .—The pipes, sustaining a high 
pressure, usually about fifty lbs. per square inch, and 
extending long distances in a level position, are liable 
to a constant noise resembling the tap of a hammer on 
the pipes. This disagreeable sound is caused by the 
steam coming in contact with the condensed water in the 
pipes, and which must be forced forward by the pressure 
of steam, as the horizontal position of the pipes will not 
admit of its running off by its own gravity. 

Health and Appearance .—The temperature of the 
pipes, under this pressure, is too high (300°) for a 
healthy and agreeable heat. The dust settles upon 
them and becomes burned, which, with the heating over 
and over again of the air of the room that is inhabited, 
occasions an offensive and unhealthy effluvia. 

The pipes are sometimes stacked up in short lengths, 
and covered with an iron screen, mounted by a marble 
slab. This is the customary mode in stores and hotels. 
The naked pipes, as well as the common clumsy pat¬ 
terns of screens, would have an objectionable appear¬ 
ance in private apartments. 

The Consumption of Fuel is much greater in a high 
pressure than in a low-pressure apparatus. Both philoso¬ 
phy and practice prove that in proportion as the pres¬ 
sure of steam is increased, the ratio of fuel required to 
give a certain amount of heat is increased, and vice 
versa. The sensible heat —the temperature of the 
heating surface—may be increased, while the latent 
heat —the great available principle in steam as a heat- 


37 


ing agent—is diminished. The amount of steam com¬ 
pressed in one instance, and the amount of steam con¬ 
densed in the other, are relied upon for heating power. 

Pressure involves fire, and fire fuel. The greater 
the pressure the less the quantity of available heat in 
proportion to the fuel consumed. In proof of this po¬ 
sition we would refer to two buildings in New York, in 
both of which steam is employed to warm about 700,- 
000 cubic feet of space. In one, the apparatus never 
exceeded 2 lbs. pressure to the square inch, in the other 
the pressure ranged about 60 lbs. 

The amount of coal consumed during the same 
length of time (one season), with the other things being 
about equal, was one-half less in the low-pressure ap¬ 
paratus (70 tons) than the high-pressure (140 tons). 
We do not refer to this as a fair experimental example, 
as there were qualifying conditions, such as the more 
perfect regulation of the draft, &c., &c., in favor of the 
low-pressure apparatus; yet a fair test, under equally 
favorable circumstances, will prove the above compari¬ 
son nearly correct. 

Attention Required .—The supply of water must be 
maintained by the use of a power-pump, to force the 
water into the boiler against the pressure of steam. 
The constant watchfulness of an engineer is demanded 
to attend to this, and to keep the fire fed with fuel. The 
valves, also, in the different return-pipes of the boiler, 
need to be opened to ventilate the heating-pipes of air, 
and shut when the air is out, to prevent the steam from 
escaping. 

Smallness of Boiler .—Here is a universal and most 
serious evil in the erection of the high-pressure appa- 
ratus. The fire-surface being too small, the deficiency 
must be made up in the intensity of the fire. With the 


38 


very strong draft necessary, the combustion is hurried, 
and consequently there is a large escape of partially 
consumed fuel up the chimney. But with boiler capacity 
sufficiently large to admit of slow and perfect combus¬ 
tion making the requisite amount of steam, the uncon¬ 
sumed particles, which in the other instance are lost, 
would be retained and burned, thus saving fuel, the 
labor of putting it on, and lessening danger. 

The intensity of the fire, and the rapid generation of 
steam, impair the boiler by throwing off the water from 
the fire-surface immediately contiguous to the fire, and 
exposing those parts, thus rendering them liable to burn. 

The smaller the boiler, the less the cost of construc¬ 
tion. The expense of the boiler is economized by the 
man who erects it, at the expense of the man who is 
obliged to furnish fuel for it. 

The Danger of Explosion is probably owing to an in¬ 
stantaneous accumulation of vast volumes of steam shut 
within the boiler. When explosions occur the water is 
usually so low as to leave unprotected considerable por¬ 
tions of the fire-surface; usually those portions acted upon 
most directly by the fire. Thus the steam becomes highly 
surcharged with heat by the fierce fire burning at the 
time. While these conditions exist, the pump driven by 
the steam, and of course increased in velocity in propor¬ 
tion to the increased pressure, is set to feeding more 
water into the boiler; the result is an explosion caused 
by the instantaneous flashing into steam of*a large 
amount of water thus rapidly thrown upon the bare red- 
hot surfaces, and into the thus highly surcharged steam. 

It will be readily seen that this state of things can 
never exist in our low-pressure system used for heating 
alone, as the water is fed into our boiler by the small 
steady force only of public water-works when available, or 


39 


the pressure from a tank or cistern, and this only through 
the small aperture of a one-half inch pipe. An excess of 
pressure, merely, would cause a bursting at the weakest 
point, and the pressure thus being relieved, nothing more 
serious would result. 

The danger from fire in this system is owing to tho 
liberation of the heat of a large amount of steam concen¬ 
trated by heavy pressure, as more fully explained in 
speaking of the same subject in the use of low pressure 
steam, page 27. Many valuable buildings have been fired 
by the high pressure steam apparatus used in them; this 
fact in itself should constitute a sufficient objection to the 
use of this kind of apparatus for heating purposes. 

VENTILATION. 

The vast aerial space that surrounds our globe, and in 
which man, beast, and vegetation exist, is but a magnifi¬ 
cent room whose floor is the earth, and whose ceiling the 
blue vaulted heavens. Here the wise Creator has pro¬ 
vided the most ample ventilation. 

The heat of the tropical sun, rarefying the air and 
causing it to ascend, while the cold air from the polar 
regions moves to supply the vacuum; the alternating tem¬ 
peratures of the different climates, the inequalities of the 
earth’s surface and the ever-varying state of the atmos¬ 
phere in respect to humidity, all tend to keep this mighty 
ocean of air in motion; while evaporation, absorption, and 
the various chemical changes constantly going on in the 
vegetable and mineral kingdoms, correct the universal 
decomposition and corruption which surround us, and to 
which man and all things are inevitably tending. 

Thus the Breath of Life is perpetually changing, being 
renewed and purified by the benign economy of God in 
the operations of nature; and it is the imperative duty of 





40 


man to see that the saa.,e purity of air is permitted to exist 
in the artificial habitations he may construct, as in the 
broad expanse of space. To effect this object much labor 
has been spent, and many ingenious plans devised. Some 
have been successful to a certain extent, but most of them 
have failed of attaining the desired object, by being too 
complicated, expensive, &c. 

Impurities to which ive are subject —The principal 
sources of impurities from which in-door air requires to be 
freed by ventilation, may be briefly summed up as follows : 

1. Expiration from the lungs of persons and animals. 

2. Perspiration (sensible and insensible) from persons 
and animals. 

3. Stoves of all kinds 

4. Hot-air furnaces. 

5. Fumes and vapors from the kitchen. 

6. Artificial illumination. 

7. Unnatural dryness of the air. 

8. Unnatural humidity of the air. 

9. Evaporation from human and other bodies. 

10. Decomposition of organic substances. 

11. Stagnant air. 

12. Damps of cellars and basements. 

13. Sickness, fumes of medicine, &c. 

The extent to which these impurities exist under an 
innumerable variety of conditions and contingencies, and 
in different localities, we will not attempt to define. 

The amount of provision requisite to be made for 
counteracting the pernicicus effects of the above-named 
causes, depends altogether upon the necessity existing in 
each individual instance. In hospitals, school-houses, 
public buildings, and all places where a large number of 
persons are congregated, the contamination of air is very 
great, and corresponding provision should be made for 
ventilation. 


41 


In private houses where hut few reside, and where 
few sources of contamination exist, less effective means 
are required to ensure proper ventilation. The remedy 
must in all cases be commensurate with the requirements, 
and this must, in a great measure, be left to the good 
sense of those whom it immediately concerns. 

Merely changing the air does not constitute venti¬ 
lation. The air may be often changed and still be more 
impure than in a stagnant or otherwise perverted state. 
Hot-air furnaces give a copious change of air to the apart¬ 
ments, and their venders are loud in proclaiming the im¬ 
portance of ventilation, making a virtue of necessity, to 
effect the sale of their wares. The remedy is worse than 
the disease in this case. The heated, gaseous air thrown 
up from the furnace is most unhealthy, while the air it 
displaces in the room is comparatively pure. A change 
in the air is effected, but ventilation is prevented. 

Equal temperature necessary. The air of a room 
may be changed, and all its impurities be removed, and 
it still be in an unhealthy condition from an uneven tem¬ 
perature. A cold current may be circulating through it 
in one part, and a warm current in another. The 
tendency of all artificial heat is favorable to this evil. 
Heated air naturally rises, and the upper strata in an 
apartment will be warmer than the lower, unless coun¬ 
teracted by some artificial process. 

Very much depends upon the condition of the air 
warmed, whether it be deprived of its natural moisture, 
and thus rendered specifically lighter, or warmed merely 
without interfering with its natural state. The heat 
from hot-air furnaces and stoves is, of all others, the least 
calculated to distribute itself in an apartment. Besides, 
the air being deprived of its moisturq by coming in con¬ 
tact with over-heated surfaces, the gases are deranged, 
and its natural gravity thus lessened. 


42 


THE NECESSITY FOR VENTILATION IN 
PRIVATE HOUSES. 

Here the principal contaminating influences to pro¬ 
vide against, are those which emanate from the human 
system, and from artificial heating and illumination. 
Taking the average opinions of the best authorities, a 
common grown person will vitiate and render unfit for 
respiration 7 cubic ft. of air per minute. 

The natural causes of impurity from the human sys¬ 
tem are : 

Consumption of oxygen (the vital element of the air'- 
by inspiration; emitting carbonic acid by expiration , 
insensible perspiration; and “the peculiar effluvia of the 
living body.” 

Thus a single person would, in 6 hours, destroy the 
air contained in a room 16 ft. square and 10 ft. high. 

But we ought not to limit our lungs to the smallest 
amount of pure air which the constitution can tolerate 
without perceptible injury. “ It is evident that the 
nearer the air within-doors approaches in purity and 
freshness the free and open atmosphere, the better will 
it conduce to health, strength, and length of life.” To 
maintain the highest state of health through our respira¬ 
tory organs, the air with which we come in contact at 
one moment, should be exchanged for fresh air the next. 
It should instantly be carried off and as often renewed. 
With every inspiration of the lungs we irrecoverably 
take from the air a portion of its vitality; with every 
expiration we actually poison it. 

A candle (6 to the lb.) will consume one-third of the 
oxygen from 10 cubic feet of air per hour. Oil lamps 
✓nth large burners will change in the same way 70 ft. 
per hour. Gas illumination produces the greatest 


43 


changes in proportion to the light evolved. Every 
cubic foot of gas burned imparts to the atmosphere one 
cubic foot of carbonic acid. A burner which consumes 
four cubic ft. of gas per hour, spoils the breathing quali¬ 
ties of 400 cubic ft. of air in that time.—Y oumans. 

The injurious consequences of foul air . By breath¬ 
ing foul air, almost every species of diseases is engen¬ 
dered ; among the first of which are cholera, consump¬ 
tion, fevers, scrofula, and all the various difficulties of 
the lungs and throat, and infant mortality. It disorders 
and prostrates the physical constitution generally, and 
has a degrading and debilitating influence upon the 
mental and moral faculties. 

Therefore it is not possible to obtain too much fresh 
air, though to obtain a large amount properly warmed, 
in cold weather, is a matter of serious if not expensive 
consideration. 

The modus operandi whereby to effect the desired 
change, purity, and even distribution of air artificially 
warmed, must be taken into consideration. On the prin¬ 
ciple that “ like cures like ” we must employ some artifi¬ 
cial process as a remedy. It would be futile to attempt 
to define any particular process of ventilation which 
would be applicable in all cases. 

As heated air has a tendency to ascend, vents or es¬ 
cape-pipes should, in ordinary cases, be provided near 
the floor. This will counteract the rising current, by 
creating a downward draft. The heaviest and most 
noxious gases floating in ^he lower part of the room are 
also drawn off. Other vents should be provided near 
the ceiling, for summer use, in connection with the lower 
ones. 

As artificial ventilation involves motion of air pro¬ 
duced either by heat or some mechanical force, artificial 


44 


heat, by being constantly in domestic use, is tLe most 
economical and available agent; and a proper warming 
apparatus becomes a convenient and important auxiliary, 
and may be arranged to perform both duties satisfac¬ 
torily. 

Artificial 'Ventilation and Cooling in Summer 
Time .—When the public become more convinced of 
the importance of proper ventilation, and are willing to 
be at the expense of pure air instead of lavishing money 
on useless decorations, we may expect to see, in common 
use, artificial appliances for a more thorough and steady 
change of air in warm weather. 

This can be effectually and safely accomplished by 
rarefying a shaft of air leading from the various rooms 
to be ventilated, by means of steam-heated surfaces 
placed in a ventilating dome on the roof, or in a chamber 
in the garret, through either of which the shaft or shafts 
may find an external opening to the outer atmosphere. 
Or a cheaper, if not more effectual mode, is to have 
double chimney jlues , by enlarging the common kitchen 
flue sufficiently to admit an interior one to be used ex¬ 
clusively for the smoke and products of combustion. 
Into the outer flue, vents may be opened from all the dif¬ 
ferent rooms, and the ordinary fire used for cooking and 
laundry purposes will rarefy the air and create a good 
draft. To accelerate the draft, and increase the power 
of ventilation, the additional heating surfaces, as in the 
former arrangement, may be applied. Of course these 
vents from the rooms must have corresponding inlets 
from out-doors, which are provided in the flues, that, 
in cold weather, bring the warm air into the rooms from 
the heating apparatus. 

Adopting either of these plans would obviate the ne¬ 
cessity of opening windows and doors, which let in dust 


45 


and noise, and unpleasant odor from thi streets, and 
which are so convenient for burglars. It would also 
prevent the unequal currents of air from those openings, 
and insure a regular change, whether the out-door at¬ 
mosphere be in motion or not. The air to be drawn 
through a room may be cooled to any extent by causing 
it to pass over ice ; it may also be purified by being fil¬ 
tered through charcoal. Both of these operations are 
practical. 

Ventilation involves Expense .—The real practical 
difficulty in ventilation is its cost. Although the at¬ 
mosphere is everybody’s property, and is the cheapest of 
all things, yet a supply of pure air in dwellings is by no 
means free of expense. To insure ventilation we must 
have motion of air, and to produce motion demands 
force, which is a marketable commodity. Whatever will 
produce available force has value in it. Whether it be 
fans and pumps driven by steam-engines, or upward cur¬ 
rents set in motion by naked fire, in both cases there is 
expenditure of fuel. It is true we may use the fire that 
must be kindled to produce warmth, and thus secure the 
additional result of ventilation, apparently without an 
additional cost. But in most cases foul air is also warm 
air, and in escaping conveys away its heat, which is thus 
lost. Contrivances have been proposed by which the 
out-flowing warm air may be made to impart its heat to 
the in-coming cold air, but they are not yet reduced to 
practice. Until this is done heat must continue to be 
lost by ventilation just in proportion to the extent. 
Hence, as was before remarked, ventilation may be 
classed with food and apparel, and it becomes a question 
of how much can be afforded. But there is this im¬ 
portant difference, that while economy in the latter—a 
plain table and coarse clothing—are at least equally fa- 


46 


vorable to health, with more expensive styles 0 / eating 
and dressing, economy of ventilation, on the contrary, 
that is, any cheapening or deterioration of the vital me- 
dium of breathing, is injurious to health. One of the 
worst evils of scarce and expensive fuel is, that the 
poorer classes feel compelled to keep their rooms as 
tight as possible, to prevent the escape of warm air and 
the consequent waste of heat.— Youmans. 

RADIANT HEAT. 

Air and objects are warmed from sources of heat by 
convection, conduction, radiation, and secondarily by re¬ 
flection. All heat that is to any extent effective in 
yielding us that warmth which we require in addition to 
the inherent heat of our bodies, is through the first- 
named means. 

All contrivances in vogue for creating in-door warmth, 
warm us principally through the air first being brought 
by circulation in actual contact with their heating sur¬ 
faces (convection). 

The extent to which heated surfaces radiate depends, 
practically speaking, upon the temperature of such sur¬ 
faces. A bed of red-hot coals, as in the open fire, is the 
most powerful radiator in domestic use. This is due, 
not only to their high temperature (1,200° to 2.000°), 
but to the multiplicity of angles of radiation which the 
variously shaped pieces of coal present. Rut the radia¬ 
tion from this, the most powerful of radiators, is, as we 
all know, quite small, and the quantity of fuel con¬ 
sumed, compared with the amount of heat afforded, enor¬ 
mous. Some investigators estimate that as much as 
fourteen-fifteenths of the heat set free by combustion 
escapes up the chimney, and is lost. 

The ordinary fire-place at one side of the room is a 


47 


good example of the extent to which radiant heat is 
available for heating purposes: for here, owing to the 
draft up chimney, all the heat yielded by conduction 
and convection is lost, and all the heat distributed in 
the apartment is through radiation. Ten feet distant 
and within the direct line of its rays, is as far as we 
can expect to receive any beneficial effect from this 
source. Surfaces of a lower temperature would be pro- 
portionably ineffectual. 

The heat-rays from a steam heated surface at 200° 
could hardly be detected at a distance of two feet. In 
fact, were a strong current of air passing over such sur¬ 
faces and up chimney, as in the open fire-place, freezing 
might occur within a few feet of them. 

The heat we get from a steam radiator, as before 
stated, is from convection —the circulation of air against 
it. In proof of this, we have found that, in actual prac¬ 
tice, a room is quite as well warmed, as otherwise, with 
the front of the radiator screened, and all extension of 
rays prevented, sufficient space, of course, being pro¬ 
vided for the circulation of air beneath. 

The theory of radiation, as put forth by some very 
learned but very unpractical savans —that rooms are 
warmed by rays from steam radiators as the earth is 
warmed by rays from the sun, is very fine; but in prac¬ 
tice we would be very liable to suffer with cold, notwith¬ 
standing this benign result. “ It is believed that the 
sun’s rays do not heat the regions of space, and the 
earth’s atmosphere is heated almost entirely by contact 
with the surface of the heated earth.”— Sillimari's Chem¬ 
istry, revised edition , page 57. 

Radiant heat alone is objectionable in a sanitary 
point of view, from the great inequality of temperature 
at different distances from the source. “ The intensity 


48 


of radiating heat (like light) is only one-fourth as 
great at a double distance.”— Arnott. Thus taking the 
temperature at one foot distant from the radiator to be 
80°, at two feet it would be 20°, at four feet 5°, and so 
on in an inverse ratio. 

Rays of heat warm only that part of an object that 
comes within their direct range. In facing a radiator 
the face is heated while the back is cold. “ The dif¬ 
ference is exactly like that between being in the shade 
and in the sun.” We cannot endure the direct rays of 
the summer’s sun, but when we are protected from them, 
and are within the genial influences of warmed air, that 
affects every part of us alike, no better condition of 
warmth could be desired. 

To have a room and its occupants evenly warmed by 
artificial radiation alone, it would be necessary to have 
the entire walls, ceiling, and floor, covered with heating 
surfaces, that the rays diverging from them may equalize 
the temperature, and strike every part of tho person at 
the same time. 


49 


MISCELLANEOUS REMARKS. 

There is at the present time a general dearth of good 
artificial heaters. Steam, as the agent for heating, is 
rapidly growing in public favor, and must eventually 
supersede all other modes, although it is, as yet, only 
in the incipient stages of development. The field is so 
broad and inviting that ambitious adventurers are plenty, 
each sanguine of ultimate success in attaining the much- 
desired object, viz., the construction of a cheap and perfect 
steam apparatus. Most of them are entirely successful 
in obtaining the former quality , but fall lamentably below 
the standard in the latter. Many are the devices con¬ 
cocted within prolific brains to effect this object, and 
most as frequently is recorded the untimely birth of some 
alien to the legitimate household of heaters. Happily 
however, for the public, they seldom attain any further 
state of development. 

Steam for mechanical applications, and steam for 
warming purposes, do not go hand in hand. The offices 
of one disqualifies it for the proper duties of the other, 
and vice versa. Theory, practice, and philosophy, all 
agree on this point. Low pressure for warming—high 
pressure for mechanical force. 

Steam in its natural, uncompressed state, (212 3 the 
same as the highest temperature of water), imparts to the 
air a mild, healthy, and agreeable heat. Hot water does 
the same, but is less efficient, and liable to freeze. There 
is no danger from fire by either of these two modes. 

High-pressure steam or water may be dangerous from 
fire because of the high temperature of its surface. By 
excessive pressure, they may have some of the unhealthy 
and dangerous qualities of the hot-air furnace. 

The limited amount of fire-surface and heating-sur- 


50 


face is a very serious deficiency in al nost every heating 
apparatus of the present day. Where a small surface is 
required to do a large amount of warming, it must of 
necessity be heated to a very high temperature. This is 
done not only at the expense of fuel,but of health. This 
evil grows out of competition in the trade to get up as 
cheap an article as possible,* but many have found to 
their sorrow that an apparatus stinted in surface is the 
dearest one of all. The combustion is imperfect by be¬ 
ing too rapid, and a large quantity of fuel escapes and 
is wasted, which with a slower fire would be burned. 

The fuel also has to be often replenished, and a de¬ 
cided loss of heat is incurred by the frequent opening of 
the furnace door, and the repeated kindling of fresh fuel. 

In hot-air furnaces the fire-surface is but the other 
side of the heating-surface—hence the intense heat that 
burns up the air, as well as the furnace itself.* 

All heating apparatuses, especially those intended for 
domestic use, should have sufficient heating capacity to 
allow the fire to burn very gradually—so gradually that 
it need not, in ordinary weather, be replenished more than 
twice in twenty-four hours. 

It is very important to have the hall, which is the 
great artery of a house, properly warmed. On the tem¬ 
perature of this—extending as it generally does through 
all the stories—to a great extent depends the tempera¬ 
ture of the whole house. In fact, a house can be toler¬ 
ably warmed by steam, and at a very small expense, from 
the hall alone. 

A room may be thoroughly ventilated without being at 
all heated; or it may be thoroughly heated without being 
in any way ventilated—the latter is too often the case. 

* We have seen them so rotten as literally to crumble to pieces by their own 
weight* 




51 


The effective and harmonious operation of the two 
systems is indispensable, in cold weather, to health and 
comfort. 

In ventilating in connection with heating, a few gen¬ 
eral rules should be observed. The air should be ob¬ 
tained pure, and retained pure in the process of heating. 
It should also be evenly distributed while passing into 
and out of the rooms. The flues that conduct the air in 
to be warmed should have their external openings from 
some high point above the line of dust, the products of 
decayed animal and vegetable matter, and the obnox¬ 
ious gases which float near the ground. These flues, as 
well as the ones that take heated air into the rooms, 
should have sufficient capacity to permit the requisite 
amount of air to pass through them without creating a 
rapid current. 

Although the cold-air duct should be of sufficient size 
to supply all the hot-air vents through the building, yet 
that supply should be varied with the demand. When 
a part of the warm-air registers are closed, a correspond¬ 
ing amount of air should be excluded from the cold-air 
duct, as well as from the fire. When the fire goes out, 
the cold air should be entirely excluded. This ar¬ 
rangement is effected in this steam-heating apparatus, 
and its advantages are obvious. An equal temperature 
of the warmed air is maintained, fuel is saved, and 
freezing avoided. 

The surface against which the air is warmed should 
never exceed the temperature of 250°; and an ample 
quantity should be furnished at this limit, to properly 
warm, in the coldest of weather, all the air that may be 
required. 

We may have the temperature of the heating surface 
higher without injury, provided, that in no instance, is 


the air liable to be confined in contact with it long 
enough to attain the same degree of heat. But this lia¬ 
bility always exists. 

Artificially warmed air is generally about 60° below 
the temperature of the surface from which it is heated. 
But when it is confined, as in the case of all the registers 
for its escape being shut, and the fire at the same time 
unchecked, where the temperature of the heating sur¬ 
face exceeds the above-named limit, not only an un¬ 
healthy but a dangerous heat is engendered. 

The heating surface should never be located contigu¬ 
ous to the fire; it should be several feet remote. This 
obviates the liability of gas and smoke, incidentally es¬ 
caping, finding their way into the hot-air chamber. 
There is also less liability of firing any wood-work that 
may form a part of the heating or ventilating arrange¬ 
ment. 

Each stratum or volume of air, as it floats against a 
heated surface, is rarefied by imbibing some portion of 
caloric, and at once ascends, making room for the denser 
or colder air, which in turn flies from the hot surface, 
thus creating a circulation that continues until an 
equilibrium of temperature is established. The rapidity 
of the circulation depends upon the difference of tem¬ 
perature in the room being warmed and the heating sur¬ 
faces, when such surfaces are located within the room. 

When the heating surfaces are placed within a cham¬ 
ber or chambers of their own, and out-door air is sup¬ 
plied to them, the rapidity of the circulation is propor¬ 
tioned to the temperature of the exterior air, its con¬ 
dition in respect to motion, moisture, etc., and the size 
length, position, and construction of the ducts for ingress 
and for egress. Much also depends upon the kind of 
heating surfaces, their shape, position, and extent; also 
upon the character of the apartments into which the 




53 


warmed air is to be discharged, in relation to outlets, 
windows, and other condensing objects and exposedness. 

In order to maintain a rapid, reliable, and consistent 
flow of warmed air, it is requisite that the heating sur¬ 
faces retain a uniform as well as an efficient temperature 
against the variableness of the outer atmosphere. 

Hot water has neither the power to maintain an 
even and adequate temperature against severe influences, 
or to be to any practical extent self controlling. (See 
page 20.) 

Hot-air furnaces, while they have power to heat , lack 
the power to control the fire; consequently, the heating 
surfaces, whose temperature depends upon the condition 
of the fire, will get unhealthily, dangerously, and waste- 
fully hot. (See page 15.) 

Steam is peculiarly calculated to fulfil these require¬ 
ments, and is, in fact, the only agent that is capable of 
accomplishing the desired ends in a warming apparatus. 
It creates a moderate, agreeable, and, at the same time, 
a proper quantity of heat, while it has, within itself, the 
necessary mechanical force, which is easily applied, to 
open and shut the draft to the fire, and thereby control 
it in exact conformity to the desired conditions of the 
different parts of the heating and ventilating arrange¬ 
ments. (See page 29.) 






























































































































































